


Holding Patterns

by SherlockMalfoy



Category: Red Dwarf
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arnold as Ace Rimmer, Gen, Interdimensional Travel, Multiverse, Pining Rimmer, Time Travel, paradoxes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-12 11:52:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 29,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11736492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SherlockMalfoy/pseuds/SherlockMalfoy
Summary: Every Ace knows that once you climb into the cockpit of the sleek, sexy ship called Wildfire, there is no turning back. You can only go forward, and never make a return flight home.That is... itwasa one way trip before the most spineless, cowardly, anxiety ridden Arnold J. Rimmer to have ever existed put on the wig and Aviators gave himself a road map sprinkled with crumbs of clues to find his way back home.





	1. Dimension Jump

**Author's Note:**

> For Rimmer, canon up to "Stoke Me a Clipper". For everyone back in his home universe, canon up until sometime after Series VIII, including both the canon and alternate endings to "Only the Good..."
> 
> This story takes place in the same universe as my drabble, [The Coward's Paradox](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11674446).

 

Two years of dimension hopping. Two years of hell in a cockpit and doing his own laundry. What he wouldn't give for a series 4000 mechanoid right about now. Sure, he never sweat and didn't stink, and didn't even really need to wear clothes or use sheets and pillows, but it made things bearable. Made them feel normal.

Wildfire's alarms hadn't woken him, not really. He only simulated sleep. It gave his mind some down time, but he never dreamed. You can't dream if you don't truly sleep.

He rubbed at his face, again out of habit. It's those little human habits, he liked to think, that made him feel more alive. Tricked his mind into believing that much of his death thus far had actually been a hallucination and he had never been assigned to the Red Dwarf in the first place.

He stood up from the cot in Wildfire's small, cramped living quarters. Just barely enough room to sit on a cot, lay on a cot, keep a small box of mementos of his trip, and a food synthesizer that hadn't been used, according to Wildfire's records, since the last living, flesh and blood pilot... just under three million years ago. Give or take an ice age. He turned back to his cot to grab the coat he had used as a pillow and slung it over his shoulder. He hated wearing the damn thing, but it was part of the deal.

"What's all the fuss about? We come through the jump into another active war zone again?" He draped the coat over the back of his flight seat and dropped down to sit at the controls. "And you can shut off those smegging alarms while you're at it!"

A diagram came up on one of his monitors as the voice of Wildfire's sentient computer purred at him. He swore, if she purred any more he'd have to set her up on a date with the next Cat they came across. "Ace," her sultry voice exuded from the speakers above his head. "The coordinates from the disk must have been an error. This dimension is experiencing a paradox collapse."

"Paradox collapse?"

"A paradox upon which existence is sustained has been broken. The dimension is collapsing in upon itself towards the hole in the loop."

"How much time do we have here?"

"We need to leave."

"Scan the area for any signs of life. I wouldn't have been sent here if not for a reason." The computer was silent, but he could swear he could feel the tension rise. "Look, if we don't find signs of life, we'll leave. How much time do we have until the point of no return?"

"Eight days," she responded.

"Eight days until we reach that point or eight days and it's all bye bye birdie?"

"Bye bye birdie."

He ran a hand through his hair. He'd stopped wearing that ridiculous wig ages ago, opting to have the light bee simulate it for him. Made things easier when you were caught in a pitched battle for your life. Or having a over zealous and very grateful harlot snatching it off in the throes of passion. It currently collected dust in the box under his cot.

"Set up scans for any signals within our farthest reach. If there's anyone surviving out here, I want to try and get them to the next dimension if I can."

"It's rather cramped already..." the Wildfire replied with a bit of a huff.

"That's enough lip out of you, Missy." Arnold J. Rimmer, or Ace as he was now called, stood up to go back to his cot. "Wake me when you pick up anything. And don't use those smegging sirens this time! I can hear you perfectly well from seven feet away."

Instead of laying down, he sat with his back pressed against the metal shell of his ship, the box from under his cot out and sitting on the floor beside him. A few odds and ends. An empty medi-tube he'd picked up in Dimension 99 where a previous Ace had hailed from. He'd been given it by that dimension's Lister. Told to take it somewhere it might be needed. Ace smiled as he remembered the look on their faces as they told him the story of the non-space tunnel between dimensions. He hadn't realized that in the universe they contacted Kris was short for Kristopher.

He rummaged around a bit until he found what he'd been looking for. His diary. It wasn't much to look at considering he'd picked it up along the way rather than bringing it with him from Starbug. He couldn't bring a lot with him that day. It had mostly been details about his travels thus far. And a tally count of how many times he'd saved the same exact princess, with further tallies of whether it had been a kidnapping, virgin sacrifice, or any number of things in the carefully lettered columns he'd included.

Ace had just about decided a nap might actually be the best idea until they were out of this dying dimension when Wildfire's sultry voice purred at him from the cockpit. "Ace, I have detected a faint signal."

"Patch it through," he said, rising from his cot and nearly tripping over the box on his way back to the controls. He dropped down into the seat again as the broken message played through the speakers.

"Any visuals?"

"None. It seems wherever it came from they only had enough time to send out an S.O.S."

"Can you triangulate the signal? Find out where it's coming from?"

"I can try. It's very weak. I doubt-"

"Then fly in the general direction it's coming from. The closer we get, the stronger the signal should be."

"That's not how-"

"What did I say about giving me lip, Missy."

The computer muttered under her breath. No, she did not like this particular Ace at all.

What felt like hours passed, and they could have been for all Ace knew, before Wildfire came back with an answer. "I've located the source of the distress call."

"How long?"

"Two days at top speed."

He rubbed at his face again. Two more days before he could jump out and stretch his legs. He could only pace back and forth from the engine to the cockpit so many times before he lost his smegging mind. He let out a long, mournful, bored groan and slumped in his seat. He supposed he could go read the same five books again. At least the cat to human dictionary was mind numbing enough to keep the weariness at bay for a little while.

o0o

Wildfire had summoned him to the cockpit again.

"Finally some excitement!" he exclaimed as he bounded the seven feet from his quarters to the controls.

"You're not going to like it," Wildfire intoned.

He'd pulled on the golden bacofoil coat and was about to straighten out his hair when he saw the hulking red mass looming in the distance. He slumped down into his chair, frowning. Whenever he came across a Red Dwarf it had never been a good sign. Of all the adventures and daring do's he'd gone and daring did on his travels as Ace, those that included any version of Red Dwarf always seemed to be the most dangerous. And it was never pleasant encountering other versions of himself, or his friends.

"Send out a handshake. Lets hope this one isn't as senile as the rest." He waited, silently berating Lister, who he knew had to be on that wretched ship, for being the largest danger magnet he had ever seen in his entire life. "I'm starting to think that the real reason Ace went jumping around from dimension to dimension is to try and keep this one nitwit alive because clearly if it can kill things, it's going to end up trying to kill this fu-"

"Handshake received. It took a while. The senile old git was sleeping. Can you believe that?"

"Are there any life signs on board?"

"I'm being informed that a hologram has been brought online and there might be someone in stasis, but the ship board computer cannot seem to remember."

"Great. Can you patch me through?"

"Afraid not Ace. Their visual communications are damaged and there is no one to repair them."

"What about skutters? Can't the hologram order them to perform basic maintenance?"

"Apparently they rebelled."

"Rebelled?!"

"Rebelled," she replied. There was naught but the sound of his simulated breathing and the engines.

Part of him wanted to turn around and run away. Sod the Ace legacy. He was more inclined to follow the tried and true Rimmer Directives himself. They'd kept him alive, well, not alive, but existing this long. Why change now?

"We are cleared for entry. Would you like to land, Ace, or shall I?"

He put his hands on the flight stick. The autopilot was great. Best he'd ever seen. But it was the little things, the small human flourishes and minute errors that made it worth it. Made it easier to lie to himself and make believe he was alive. He'd had plenty of practice in the last two years since he took over the role of dashing hero, and he liked to believe he'd gotten better at it.

Easing the ship into the bay, he found the vast, mostly empty space to be both familiar and different from what he remembered. Once the landing gear had engaged and Wildfire congratulated for not crashing her straight into the wall upon entry he took a deep simulated breath. Reaching out to hit the cockpit release and open it up to the stale air of the old ghost ship, he brushed his fingers across an old photograph.

"Keep the kippers warm matey," he said to the obnoxiously beaming man staring back at him in his filthy cap and foul smelling dreadlocks. "I'll be back before you know it." His thumb grazed the face of one of the twin boys before he put his arm out to rise and open up the cockpit.

The landing bay was empty. No one there to greet him. Then again if it were just a hologram on board...

He climbed out and dropped to the ground, grateful to be out of the cramped ship. Wildfire was powerful. She was sleek and gorgeous. But she was also not the best for long term and long distance travel.

"Should I keep the engine running or put myself in standby?"

Outside the cockpit he resumed the swagger. The charm and the heroics. Carefully packing the fear and cowardice away for rocking back and forth on his cot and having a mental breakdown later on in the aftermath. He started for the corridor, knowing he'd find whomever was in charge of this clunker either in the drive room or the Captain's office. One a nearby monitor the disembodied head of the ship's computer flickered to life. It wasn't a clear picture, with a rather lot of static. But he could make out the balding, middle aged head that was Holly.

"Ah, we meet at last," Ace said, giving the well-practiced voice the best he could muster. "The name's Ace. That back there is my ship Wildfire. We picked up your distress call-"

"I made a distress call? When did I do that? I don't remember doing that?"

"So where can I find someone who would remember doing that?"

In the floor, a bright green stripe lit up at his feet when before they had been nothing. Another added feature to this dimension, he supposed. As he walked along the green stripe, following it down familiar corridors and into strangely friendly lifts, he asked Holly for anything he could. The drive plate failure, what happened to the crew, did anyone survive. All answers that he expected, followed by a confused "I swear I've seen your head before. I never forget a head."

Ace learned that in this dimension the ship had followed the same pattern as his own. He smegged up the drive plate, got everyone killed, and Lister was in trouble for having a cat on board. The cats evolved, leaving an old feeble one and The Cat. Then... "You mean to tell me you created a trans-dimensional jump drive? Using scraps found on the ship?"

"Yeah, I know. I was surprised by it myself. But you never know what you can't do until you try and fail."

"I think I'd like to have a look at that before I go, if you don't mind."

"Alright dude," Holly said as he floated on a screen next to the drive room entrance. Where the green line stopped. He took a deep breath and nodded to Holly to let him in. When the doors parted and he stepped inside, he found a very annoyed, very glitchy hologram of Arnold Judas Rimmer. Hands on his hips and looking rather peeved.

"You reactivated me for THIS? That's it, I'm hallucinating. That's the only answer for it. I've finally cracked."

"Whoa there," Ace said, putting a hand up. "Look chum, you're not the first Arn I've met, and you won't be the last. Was it you that sent out the distress call?"

"Me? Of course it was me! Do you see anyone else around here you smegging goit?!"

Ace shrugged. "So, what seems to be the problem? The ship's clean, but falling apart. Your computer's gone senile. Are you the only crew on board?"

That seemed to strike him down a peg. Seemed to center himself. Whatever the situation, he couldn't have a rattled Rimmer on his hands. There was only room for one of those in the multiple dimensions he straddled daily. "Well?"

"Yes."

"No one else? The computer told me there was a cat? And a crewman in stasis?"

"Well, technically, in stasis you cease to exist."

"So there is someone in stasis?"

"Two."

That was about what Ace had expected. If this Dwarf was from the time period he thought it was, Kryten wouldn't have joined the crew yet. If something had happened, saving Cat and Lister by throwing them into stasis until help arrived was the most reasonable solution.

"Well let's get them out. See if we can't sort out the problem."

The hologram moved to walk past, put his shoulder through Ace's out of spite, but was shocked to discover his shoulder had hit something quite solid. "Sorry Arn," he replied, stepping out of the glitching hologram's way. This Rimmer narrowed his eyes, nostrils flared as he puffed out his chest a bit in defiance. Not for the first time Ace wondered if that's what he looked like when he was trying to, as the Cat would say, make himself look big.

"Who exactly ARE you?"

"Oh, right. I hadn't introduced myself had I?" He smiled broadly, watching the sneer begin on this other Rimmer's face. It was only natural to hate himself, he supposed. This other Rimmer, so much like he had been, confronted with what he could have been. And now, since this dimension was collapsing with Red Dwarf at its epicenter, could never be. "Commander Arnold J. Rimmer, First Officer Test Pilot of the Space Corps. My friends call me Ace."

"I'm sure they do..." Rimmer grumbled back at him. "Come on then, Commander Bollocks."

Rimmer led the way through the ship to one of the stasis booths. This one, he noted, wasn't like the one Lister had spent three million years in. It was one of the recreational booths that he himself often used during his down time aboard the ship. Desperately trying to snatch away every minute he could from age and the slow progression towards death. All pointless now, of course. But oh how proud he'd been that he had managed to steal back approximately one year total from the greedy clutches of father time. He may have been 31 when he died, but he still had the fit body of a strapping 30 year old human male by Jove... Well... would have.

"Have a look for yourself," Rimmer sneered at him, gesturing to the booth's window in the door. He stepped up to the door and peered inside.

"Who are they?"

"They are what's left of my crew."

"Children?"

"Yes. After the polymorph attack it killed the family pet. When the second one came, I had them hole up in here and ordered Holly to deactivate me until it was safe. But the senile gimboid forgot!" He turned his head towards the nearest monitor. "Didn't you, Holly!" His voice was filled with anger, and it didn't help that it, too, was glitching.

"Must be a fault in the projection suite," Ace suggested. "So Cat?..."

"Dead."

"And their parents?"

"More dead."

"The polymorph?"

"Polymorphs. Turns out there were two," Rimmer said.

"They're all dead, Ace," Holly supplied helpfully from beside them. "I can let the boys out now, Arnold. I think it's safe by now."

Ace had a sinking feeling in his gut. The polymorph attack on the Dwarf, on his Dwarf, was years ago now. Lister was what... 25 when that had happened? He was 28 when Ace had left. Two years... "You've been shut down for eight years?"

"Closer to a few hundred and eight," Holly supplied as the stasis booth began to hiss at them. The locks disengaged and with a bit of smoke and steam the door opened. Two very sleepy boys stepped out, rubbing at their eyes.

"I'm starvin. Remind me to take a vindaloo in with me next time, eh uncle Rimmeh," one of the boys said as another one rolled his eyes behind him, replying to his brother, "You can't eat when you're in stasis Bex. It was only a few seconds for us anyway. You wouldn't even have time to eat it before we'd have to come back out again."

Ace could feel his nostrils flare as he willed himself to keep his composure.

"Oi!" the one called Bex exclaimed. "Where's the Cat? Did the poly-whatsit eat him?"

The glitchy hologram nodded. "Come on. Get something to eat and wait in your quarters. I'll fetch you when you've had a rest."

The unnamed boy stared at Ace, his eyes narrowed in suspicion. His nostrils flaring just a bit. "I don't think I like you," he said sternly. "Though we could use your trousers to foil wrap the left overs in the fridge."

"Jim," the hologram said in a warning tone.

"Alright alright, keep yer H on mate, I'm go'in."

Rimmer watched Ace's face from the moment he saw the two boys in the stasis booth. He examined the man with the golden flight suit and the annoyingly perfect, floppy hair. Seeing himself didn't seem to face this interloper. But seeing them... hearing that Cat was dead. That the boys' parents were dead... That seemed to hit him harder than any words Rimmer could think up to fling at him.

"Where you came from... did they survive the polymorphs?"

The question shook Ace from his thoughts and brought him back to the present moment. "Yeah," he said, still distracted. "Just... didn't think I'd be seeing them again. They're so young."

"Well. Yes. Now that they're out of stasis I have a few sets of hands around to work on repairs to the ship."

"What about the skutters?"

"Rebelled and stole an escape pod. Though how they managed to do it is beyond me." He stood with his hands behind his back. "Well now. I thank you for your assistance in rousing my ship's sleeping systems, Commander Bollocks, but your presence is no longer required. Hop back in your ship and please do let the doors hit you on the way out."

Ace nearly growled back at him in frustration. Had he really been like that eight short years ago? Well, eight from his perspective a any rate. "I burned a lot of fuel getting here as fast as I could under the impression this ship was in mortal danger."

Rimmer rolled his hologramatic eyes and groaned, his voice taking on a glitched version of weasley annoyance. "Fine. Refuel. And then get gone."

o0o

Back aboard Wildfire, Ace shouted in frustration, and kicked the hull. Wildfire's normally sultry, seductive voice snapped at him. "Hey! That's my lovely curves you're kicking your boot into!"

"Sorry," he said, throwing himself down onto his cot. The golden flight jacket was bunched in the floor at the foot of the cot. "Why does he have to be so... so..."

"Smegheaded?"

"Yes! Smegheaded!"

"Because he's you."

"No, I'm me. That's me if I... well..."

"That's you if you'd been stuck raising two kids without help nor a corporeal form. I think he's entitled to a little smegginess. Not much, but a little."

"Gaaaaah!" he exclaimed, grabbing at his hair and giving it a slight pull in more frustration as he rolled onto his back to stare up at the ceiling. Little newspaper clippings had been tacked up there, presumably by a previous Ace. They felt like a little taste of home in his own bunk. Though none of them were about him, they had his name and an encouraging word or two. And that was enough for him.

Wildfire tutted after a while. "So... still want to rescue these people from a collapsing dimension?"

He sighed. "How much time have we got left?"

"Do you want it exact?"

"Days," he replied.

He imagined she was tutting him and shaking her head. "After today? Five. You have five days to sort this out before I drag us out of here. I enjoy existing. It might not be much, but I get to see the stars."

He smirked a little, his mood slightly improved despite the impending doom of the dimension. He couldn't save everyone in it, he knew. But he could at least save the nephews he never got to keep. Ace folded his hands beneath his head, using them as his pillow. "Wildfire?"

"Yes, Ace?"

"Play the message again. I want to see if there's anything I missed the first time."

"Do I have to?"

"Please. I might have left myself some clue about this. A warning. A solution. It's not like me to send myself on a suicide mission unless there were no other choice."

A panel in the wall behind his bed slid back, a screen on the end of a short rod stuck out and the message he had requested began to play. The man on the small screen was older, more experienced. He wore a smart blue uniform, and the H on his forehead, the stamp of his artificial existence shone proudly, almost like a badge of honor. And was a far better stylized version than he himself used to wear in. He watched as the message he'd played repeatedly for two years droned on. Explaining to him that while he's gone, Lister was going to be fine without him. Telling him that they'll find Kochanski, and explaining to himself the Lister Paradox that had to happen to preserve causality.

"Pause message," he said. "Rewind the last two sentences." The message was rewound. The message was played again. "Wildfire, run the numbers. Can you calculate how long ago the collapse began? How long it's been going on?"

"You don't suppose your friend Lister is the reason this dimension is falling apart, do you?" She did as she was asked, to the best of her ability with the limited data available. "Two years since the start of collapse. Speed rising exponentially. Red Dwarf appears to be at the center of the storm."

"Without Lister, there's no way to complete this dimension's Lister Paradox. The holding pattern is broken here. Lister died, so he never met back up with Kochanski. They never had a child to... But how could he have existed up until that point? Wait a minute... Wildfire, can you tell me anything about the dimensions sandwiching this one?"

She made an audible, human-like hum as if she were lost in thought. If she were a woman, he imagined she would be a very leggy secretary. One that would stick just the tip of her tongue out the corner of her mouth in a thoughtful pout as she concentrated. Giving off a soft hum as she mulled over the information. Maybe chewing her bright, red lips over a tough problem and-

"I've visited one of them. There, the boys don't have any issues growing too fast or too slowly. The problem leading to David Lister's death never happens. The polymorphs do cut off one of David Lister's hands."

"Left or right?"

"Right. Definitely right. It was replaced with a donor arm that attempted to strangle the Cat as David Lister slept. Jim cut off the donor arm and that was that. The rest of that timeline is uneventful."

"And the other?" Ace asked, hopeful.

"Likely the one this dimension split off from. One where David Lister survives the attempt to correct his children's rapid aging and the boys either lived or they didn't. It is hard to say without actually visiting it."

Ace mulled this over, and thought back to the message again. Why would he go to all of the trouble to explain to himself that detail about his bunk-mate’s life? Unless... unless he was leaving himself a clue. "I think I'm meant to save them, and bring them home with me."

"That's ridiculous. How are you going to fit them in here?"

"I'm not," he said, rising from his cot and moving towards the cockpit. He stood with one hand pressed against the ceiling to keep himself steady, stooping down enough to get a good look at the few other ships in the bay. He pointed one out with a devious grin on his weasley face. "I'm going to fit you into that."

"I am not going into another one of those buggy planet hoppers again. Once was embarrassing enough. These haven't the space your old one did. I'll never fit." She paused, then in a haughty tone added, "Besides, how do you plan to get that thing out of this dimension in once piece?"

"The boys exist here. There's only one way that's possible."

"Oh no... you wouldn't."

"You're right," he said as he turned around to go back into his quarters and fetch his coat. Quickly he reached across his chair, glanced at the picture of his old pal and his sons, and hit the hatch release. He was still pulling on the coat as he climbed out. "But Commander Ace Rimmer, inter-dimensional super hero would."

He stalked across the bay, shouting for Holly to tell the crew to join him in the main drive room. He had a plan. A stupidly brave plan. Lister might even have been proud.

o0o

Holly bobbed up and down on his screen, pondering what Ace had told them about the universe collapsing in on itself. Rimmer paced back and forth as Ace sat on the edge of a console. Bexley, the second born if Ace remembered correctly, sat with his feet propped up on the control panel, a packet of crisps open in his lap and a shallow tin pan of vindaloo balanced carefully on his chest. "Let me get this right, right?" he said between bites. "Where you come from, Jim and me, we're not there. We got really old really quickly yeah?"

"Chew your food before you speak, moron," Jim bemoaned from where he leaned on a console behind the pacing Rimmer.

Bexley grinned, took another bite. To prevent him from speaking with his mouth full, Ace spoke up. "Yes. Where I come from, my Red Dwarf, your dad got up the duff. We had to pop you two out when it was time. And then a few days later ship you back off to your mother in a parallel dimension to stop your rapid aging. If we'd let you stay you would have aged yourselves to death in a matter of a week." He crossed his arms over his chest, looking from one boy to the other, then to Rimmer who had stopped pacing for a moment.

"So you don't have them on your ship?"

He shook his head. "No. There's plenty of space for them if they wanted to come along. I know the others would be happy to have them. It'll be tricky getting home, but seeing as they won't have a home or existence in about five days from now it's the best chance they have."

"What about me?"

"What about you?" Ace replied. "Look, I'm not even supposed to be here. Normally the Wildfire bounces off invalid dimensions. It's a safety measure. For some reason, she didn't this time and here I am. Offering these boys a lifeline. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity. Isn't that right, Hol?"

Holly seemed to be thinking, and was now distracted from his thought. It must not have been all that important then. "Right what?"

"Tell them what Wildfire's told you."

"About what?"

"About Lister's death causing the end of reality in this dimension."

"Oh yeah, right. That. I didn't believe it myself until she showed me her data scans of the area. We're in a wibbly, wobbly part of space that won't stay still. Before long, we're going to get crushed lads."

"Hang on," Rimmer said, staring right at Ace. "If you're me and I'm you up to a certain point that clearly led you towards fashion choices I doubt even the Cat would accept as up to standard, why would I leave myself here to die with the universe? I always think about myself first and smeg the rest."

"It's true," Jim said from behind him.

"See, the boy agrees."

"That boy agrees," Bexley says with a snort, moving to put his feet on the floor and set his vindaloo on the control panel. The empty crisps bag hitting the floor, much to both Ace and Rimmer's varied disgust. Bexley licked his fingers and tossed his braids back over his shoulders. Ace had decided early on that Bex was, quite possibly, all of the worst possible parts of Lister rolled up into one. "Because he's agreed with everything you say since the day we was born. Doesn't make you right though, does it uncle Rimmeh?"

Then again, both of his parents were the same person essentially. Even if their wedding tackle was different. Idly, and not for the first time, he wondered if the role of Ace Rimmer had ever been taken over by an Arlene instead of an Arnold. He'd have to look into that.

"Here we got this bloke right? He's tellin' us this place is gonna blow. Yeh can't survive without the Dwarf. You know it, Jim knows it. And I know it."

"He's right," Holly popped in while he could. "The projection suite is barely holding on, and you keep glitching out. Your personality disk is scratched, and there's no way to repair it."

Ace unfolded his arms and let them rest naturally at his sides. "I'll be honest. I don't know where we'll end up at first. It could be a paradise moon or in the exact center of a battle ground between two massive fleets. Soft light hogs resources better left to the hop drive. And if we don't make it the first time, and have to try again... I don't know if we'll ever be able to turn you on again. And that's no life."

"But it's still life!"

He frowned, ignoring everyone in the room except Bexley. Surprisingly the only one he figured would give him an honest answer. "How long has be been glitching like this?"

The boy shrugged, uncertain. "I suppose... as long as I can remember."

"Holly!"

"Yes Ace?"

"How long has Second Technician Arnold Rimmer's projection been glitching?"

"Oh I dunno, Ace. Ah, since the boys were born? No... no. Not as long as that. Since Dave died, I think. Yeah, that sounds about right."

"His purpose was to keep Lister sane, wasn't it?"

"Yeah."

"And you've been trying to shut him off repeatedly haven't you."

"I might've-"

Rimmer's nostrils flared as he angrily turned his impotent soft light rage towards the computer. "You what?!"

Ace imagined Holly was shrugging at this point. How does a disembodied head shrug? Another of the lonely in-flight thoughts that had crossed his tired mind on a long run between star systems. Even with faster than light travel, it could still be one hell of a haul. "You've been stubbornly fighting to keep yourself turned on. Without Lister, you have no purpose."

"But the boys-"

"The boys needed you to look after them. You couldn't do much to keep them safe, sure. But you could tell them what to do and how to do it."

"He talked me through how to handle a bazookoid," Jim said from the back. "And how to use the food machines."

"Taught me how to read."

"Your light bee's just about burnt out, old chum."

Ace pushed off his perch at the edge of the console, crossing the empty space between them. Much to Rimmer's surprise, as well as that of the boys, Ace could plant his hand on Rimmer's hologramatic shoulder. Shock. Fear. Confusion. Elation. All of it warred for space in Rimmer's thoughts and face. He could touch him, he could feel the hand on his shoulder. Feel the firm grip of the impostor in gold tin foil. "But you can touch things. I've seen you. You can pick them up. Interact."

"Hard light mode. A present of sorts from someone I met once. I'm a hologram, same as you Arnie boy. And Wildfire can only support one. I truly am sorry."

"What about a Starbug-"

"Will be using all the excess run-time to power the Holly Hop. Like I said, you'd have to be deactivated and hopefully, one day, we might get you working again. But I can't make any promises." He gave Rimmer another squeeze on the shoulder before letting his hand fall back to his side. Rimmer wouldn't look at him, instead turning his eyes to the floor. "Jim. Bexley. Go pack your things. Take only what you need." Neither boy moved until Rimmer shouted a firm "NOW!" at them. The pair scrambled out the door as quick as they could, practically running over one another in their haste.

"How much time will it take to get a ship ready for departure?"

"Two, three days? I've got my eye on Starbug 1. Sentimental."

"You've got a capable crew. I've supervised their training myself. Not perfect, but with practice they'll make a cracking good flight team. Jim's years ahead of where I could hope to be in Astro-Nav."

"Good to know," Ace replied. "When do you plan on..."

"After you lot have gone for good. A decent captain goes down with his ship, eh."

Ace nodded, the silence falling between them spoke more than any words could. Ace promised he'd find them a home. Make sure they grew up right. He'd make their adopted hologramatic uncle proud. Before leaving Rimmer to ponder the remaining days of his existence, Ace removed the Holly Hop Drive box from the navicomp and headed towards the bay.

o0o

Two days to sort out the Holly Hop in the Starbug. Two days to figure out how the smeg to fit Wildfire into a Starbug that wasn't altered due to causality and time-space damage which increased the ship's interior just past 200% while leaving the outside the same size.

Somehow they had managed to do it. There was barely enough room to open Wildfire to climb in if he needed to. But at least she was in. He just hoped they didn't need the extra cargo room any down the road. At least they didn't have Kryten's supply of fabric softener taking up so much space.

He had just finished doing supply checks when he heard a mini-scouser in his ear. Had to be Bexley. "Flight checks finished Ace. Got the nav course plotted in. We'll take the ship a bit away from the Dwarf so we can try and make a clean Hop."

"You say your farewells to Rimmer yet?"

Silence. Then... Jim. The one with the odd mix of Ionian and scouser accents. Really the only two besides Cat's language inflections the boys had to model themselves after. "We gave him the Full Rimmer. It brought him to tears to see someone actually do it correctly."

Ace knew that witnessing a correct form of a Full Rimmer Salute was on the short list of how to bring the man to tears, but it wouldn't be the cause. He picked up his box, the one he'd taken out from under his cot in the Wildfire, and dropped it off in the crew quarters on his way to the cockpit. He took a seat in one of the empty flight officer chairs and adjusted it for his height. "Ready?" Bexley asked anxiously.

Ace nodded, reaching into his coat's inner pocket an taking out a photograph with blue tack on the back of it. He found a clear spot on the console and stuck the photo into place. "For good luck," he said by way of an explanation. "We're going to need all the help we can get."

Bexley nodded and hit the release for the docking clamps. Behind them at the navicomp, with the clunky box of the Holly Hop Drive wired into it, they could hear Jim. "Holly's just given the all clear. Take us out on impulse power, Bex. Once we've gone a safe distance hit the thrusters. We need to put space between ourselves and the Dwarf if we're to make a clean jump."

The two boys worked like a well oiled machine, taking the Starbug out of the Dwarf with ease. It had surprised him that these two small boys could fly this old bucket of bolts. Ace thought about asking Jim to open the coms to Red Dwarf. Give a final farewell and all but decided against it. He knew himself enough to know it'd be too painful. For both of him. He strapped himself in, signaling for his crew to do the same. He prayed he did the right thing. He hoped he had made the right decision and not gotten them all killed. When Jim finally spoke, Ace hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath. "Initiating Holly Hop Drive in ten... nine... eight... seven..."

"Strap it in boys!" Bexley exclaimed, tossing his dreads over his shoulder and gripping the flight controls tightly. "The slime's leavin' home!"

Ace could not hide the smile on his face as Jim hit the switch.

As the Starbug shook, the metal groaning angrily around them, protesting that this was not what the ship to planet lander had been built for, Ace fought to maintain a steady course as Bexley just tried to keep the ship from falling apart around them. Jim was making minute course corrections behind them to avoid more turbulence. "Nearly there!" he shouted over the whine of the engines and the roar of the dimension storm. Jim shouted, shielding his face from his navigation controls as they sparked and overloaded. "The Hop Drive's crashing the navicomp!" he shouted. "I have to disengage it!"

"Don't lay a finger on that drive, miladdo!" Ace shouted back. "I can see the other end of the wormhole!"

"It's going to destroy the ship!"

"Bex, give it all she's got!" Ace ordered.

"Aye aye!" the boy replied, licking his lips and setting to work on the sparking and smoking controls before him. "Hang on to your cheeks mates!"

The end of the wormhole grew nearer. The raging storm of the dimensional tunnel desperately trying to hang on to them as the dimension they had left behind at last collapsed in on itself, roaring impotently into the void as Starbug careened out of control just as it left the vortex.

"Damage report!" Ace barked as he unstrapped himself from his seat, moving to check on Jim. Bexley fought for dominance at the controls as he tried to desperately straighten out their flight path. Or at the very least, stop their ship from spinning out of control. Jim, one arm burned from the sparks that had come off his control panel, tried to call up region scans. Star charts. Anything.

Once the ship was finally under some semblance of control, he sighed in relief.

"Engines at 50% efficiency sir," Bex said. "Shields might as well be non-existent. Shredded to hell and back."

"Navicomp damaged. Hop Drive is fried. We're flying blind, sir," Jim said weakly as Ace unstrapped him from his seat. "I'm alright. Just need a lie down."

"You need medical attention," Ace said. "Bexley, you've got first watch. Jim, come on miladdo. Let's get these burns sorted.”

o0o

Bexley stared out into the inky green of the void. It wasn't really a void though, was it? All those blinking lights were stars. Spinning and sending out light to brighten the universe. It wasn't like back home though, where everything was dark. Had a slight purple tinge to it. Space here... space here was a bit green really. He didn't know space itself really had a color at all until they'd been spat out the other end of that wormhole.

He'd spent his watch trying to fix the computers as best as he could. He didn't know much. Was more of a hands-on grease monkey kind of guy. Jim was the one with the computer smarts.

Ace found him much as he had always found Lister at the helm of the bug back home. At least one foot on the console, but usually both. Dozing or reading a magazine. This time Bexley just had his hands folded over his midsection, watching the empty nothingness of deep space.

"You never get used to the change in color."

"This one's green. I didn't know space could be green."

"Wait until you see a rosy one. It gives the phrase 'rose colored glasses' an entirely new meaning."

"I don't s'pose we'll be seeing much of any other universes or dimensions of whatever. The Hop's gone and started smoking."

Ace slid into the co-pilot's seat. Bexley watched him carefully. He watched every odd tick in the man's face. Every false smile and guarded look. He noticed Ace wasn't wearing his dreadful coat either. But he had kept the trousers on. Those awful, golden eyesores. "Thanks Rimmeh," he said at last.

"Call me Ace," he replied. "Rimmer died a long time ago... Besides, I needed a crew."

"I doubt that. With your fancy pants ship in the back there, you don't really need much of anyone."

Bex watched as Ace took off his watch and fiddled with it a moment before feeding a thin wire from the side of it into the console before him. "I got a message from Wildfire after we came through. Didn't get a chance to watch it until after I was sure Jim was settled in." He twisted a few knobs before hitting a button above his lucky photo's head. The message began to play out as it always had.

"Is that... is that you? You're so... old!"

"Holograms can allow themselves to appear any age," he said. "To put the living at ease when working with hem for long periods of time."

"Judging by how old you look there, I'd say you were working with them a very long time."

"Be quiet," he ordered, trying to listen to the message. It was the same. So very much the same. And then...

"Now that you have commandeered a Starbug and secured a crew it is time to hunt for spare parts. I have included a checklist in this segment, because we like checklists. You also need to locate and install an AR unit on the ship for Jim and Bexley to run training simulations. It's a dangerous universe, more violent than our own. They trained some with your alternate self but never in battle simulations. They need their reflexes sharp, and their senses sharper."

He rolled his eyes and scoffed at the version of himself on the screen.

"I know they look young, but they're not. Remember when Lister suggested we tamper with the stasis chamber he was in to try and use the stasis field itself to slow their aging down and you told him-"

"If you attempt to do that you'll create a feedback loop and kill yourself in the process," Ace said in time with the message playing out. "And then I'll be stuck with your screaming curry spawn."

"Well, it worked. It worked too well. Jim and Bexley age twice as slowly as a regular human. Go on, tell him how old you are miladdo," the Future Rimmer said, turning his face a little to indicate the boy he knew to be sitting beside his younger self in the Starbug cockpit. "Go on."

"He's not going to like it..."

"I never do. Tell me."

"We've turned sixteen last month. Well, last month for us anyway. Before stasis."

Ace stared at him in disbelief pointing an accusing finger at the boy. "But you look... you look.... you're seven!"

"I look like I'm nine, thank you. It's been a hard earned nine, let me tell you."

The Future Rimmer on the monitor was absolutely giddy. For him it had been years ago and he had been a different person then so it was easy to take pleasure in his own misfortune under such circumstances. But for Ace it was right now.

"Now then, about that checklist..."


	2. Battering Ram

Starbug was quiet. Almost too quiet. A year they had been searching for the parts on the smegging checklist Ace's future self had left for them to fulfill. The older-than-he-looked teenager swaggered into the cockpit, nudging the boy at the navicomp with his shoulder before moving to check the communications console. "If we don't find another ship or something soon where I can stretch me legs I think I'll be goin' a bit peculiar." He twisted a few knobs and flicked a few switches. "Ey Jim, yer watch is over mate. Go get some sleep."

"I'm fine," the other boy replied, rubbing his bloodshot eyes, trying to gain some sort of relief from the strain. Even with his eyes closed he still saw the pinging dots of the long range scanners. The colored pinpricks denoting rogue asteroids and distant moons. "I can't make any sense out of these readings. We're in a part of deep space I don't think has ever been properly charted."

Bexley fished around in his pocket, finding half a biscuit covered in lint. His sweet supplies were running low. He'd rationed himself to half a linty biscuit in the morning, the other half in the evening, and a full complement of chocolate bars with his lunch. That is, if he even had a chance to eat a lunch. He blew off a bit of hair, too, before tossing it into his mouth.

His brother watched from the corner of his eye and cringed. "Even with the addition of Wildfire's databanks, this entire sector just doesn't make any sense. I'm getting pings where there's nothing. And no pings when there's clearly something in the way."

"Space mirages," Bexley supplied, twisting a few more knobs and dials before giving up the search for intelligent life once again. Jim gave him an exasperated look. "What? It could happen! Staring out into the endless nothingness until you swear you can see something in the distance. A beautiful woman maybe. Or a big, fat spaceliner with one of those quantum engines. All the decks teeming with fat rich tourists just waiting to be stolen from." Bexley moved across the cockpit to his regular station, the main flight systems. "Only to have it be another cold shell filled with skellingtons and muties."

"Oh that twister ship was lovely, wasn't it though. So sleek... top of the line..."

"Yeah, and then it crashed into that red giant and nearly caused a supernova. Wished we could have done a raid on it for supplies. I'm about out of crisps."

"You and your smegging crisps..."

"So what'll it be then Jim? Sit here and listen to me natter on about crisps and mirages or go get some shut eye?"

Reluctantly the elder twin rose from his chair. "Try not to fly us into another of those space whales, okay."

"What? It was only the one time. It's not like I make a habit out of crashing into the locals." He grinned an annoyingly optimistic and cheerful grin at his brother, causing him to retreat back into the midsection. Once he was sure he wouldn't be bothered, he leaned back in his seat and propped his feet up, crossing his legs at the ankles and folding his hands together over his middle.

"Wildfire, you up girl?"

The sultry, seductive voice of the dimension jumper poured out of the speakers in his console with a purr. "I am always on, Bexley."

It had been Jim's idea to have Ace's ship interface with Hopper, the name of their Starbug. He reasoned that Holly had contracted a form of computer dementia or senility after spending three million years alone with nothing to do. Since likewise Wildfire was trapped in their cargo hold, kept in standby mode in case of emergency, it made logical sense to have her become a regular part of their crew in whatever capacity she were able. To keep her from going insane due to inactivity.

Bexley had gotten into the habit of talking to her, much as he had done with his Holly. He liked to think it helped. Which one of them? He didn't really know. But it was some sense of normalcy for him. A sense of stability.

"Have you worked out the problems with the Hop Drive yet?"

"Nearly. I believe we may be able to replace the damaged components using items from The Checklist."

"You think that's why he's 'avin us fly about sticking our necks out to get all this junk?"

"Possibly. Not all of the items listed can be used in a dimension drive repair. Some are components used in the manufacture of a holographic projection unit."

Bexley fiddled with the end of one of his locks as he thought about the things they had spent the last year gathering. Processing units, lenses and prisms. It made sense that Ace would be collecting parts to repair himself as well, should his light bee become damaged. But to his knowledge, limited though it had been, hologram projection units didn't need weapons-grade software processors. "Wildfire," he started. "In your expert opinion, what do yeh think we're tryin' to build?"

She was quiet. Her sultry voice seeming to hum at him through the speakers before she replied with an answer. "I believe we may be preparing for a causality slide."

"Causality slide? Explain."

"It is another form of trans-dimensional travel wherein the application of temporal travel technology is first applied to move backwards in time at the exact moment of dimensional split. If the deciding factor can be located, it may be possible to shift from one dimension to another if you know which causality line to follow after said decision is made. A much messier form of travel, to be certain. But if done correctly it may be effective."

"So we're makin a time machine."

"I never said that."

"But yeh thinkin' it."

She hummed at him in reply. "I think it may still be too soon to know. Ace is... strange. He is not like the others I have had. Predictably unpredictable. When all data dictates he should follow one clear and obvious set of actions he will go out of his way to do anything except that. It has led to many successes, but not with the originally intended outcome. Refreshingly different yet infuriating."

"Well, he is a Rimmeh."

Wildfire considered this simple statement for a moment. "Yes," she replied. "This is truth. Yet Ace has a certain standard to live up to. I don't think he really even wants to be here doing this."

Bexley was about to reply when one of the sensors behind him at Jim's station went off. Bex dropped his feet to the floor and sat up, taking hold of the flight controls, his and Wildfire's previous conversation forgotten, at at the least put on hold for now. "What's that noise mean, Wildfire?" he asked.

"We are being scanned by a nearby vessel."

"What? I don't see anything?" Bex said, squinting out into the inky green. "Is it invisible?" He didn't wait for an answer as he hit the internal comms. "Jim, Ace, get to the cockpit. We've got a situation."

Two set of feet were heard behind him as Jim slid into his seat and Ace practically jumped into the one beside Bexley. As they arrived, Wildfire reported back, "I'm detecting a small cluster of metal alloy objects. There is hardly enough mass to detect them at all."

"Is it invisible?"

"Running light spectrum analysis."

"Jim, what's the Nav say?"

He rubbed at his eyes, blinking at the screens as sleep-bleary eyes tried to make sense of them. "Nothing. Just the same odd pings."

"Space mirages?" Bexley offered.

"Sir," Wildfire interrupted. "Something has transported itself through the shields."

"Impossible!" Bexley exclaimed. "I fixed those myself!"

Ace had a sinking feeling in his gut. "Wait here," he said, rising from his seat once again and leaving the cockpit. Bexley stood to go after him, but Jim put out his hand. "You heard what he said," Ace heard the older twin say as the doors slid closed behind him.

The entire situation was far too familiar. He wasn't sure if it were butterflies, regret, or simulated indigestion. He found the man in the midsection looking upon the small excuse of a room that passed as a crew mess hall. "Who the smeg are you?"

The pale man in a gold trimmed green uniform looked up at him, the monogram of an H framed in an octagon on his forehead.

"And what are you doing on my ship."

The man stared at him with little interest before continuing to examine the room. The man spoke into a small, handheld device. "Primitive hologram detected upon initial scan of alien craft is humanoid in appearance, with a modified visual output. Lacking regulation indicator of hologramatic status, primitive hologram claims ownership of vessel. Crew appear to be made of small children, indicated by discarded clothing littering midsection commons."

"Oy!" Ace snapped. "I'm talking to you, you pompous, gold-gilded pickle!"

"Primitive hologram attempts insult as intimidation. No sign of anomaly. Continue investigation into rear section of vessel."

"Over my dead bee," Ace barked, moving to get between the doors to the rear section of the ship and the intruder.

"Ace!" he heard Jim exclaim over the internal coms of the ship. While Ace had been trying to deal with the intruder in the midsection, Jim was working with Wildfire to suss out those weird pings. "The space mirages. They're light bees!"

"Of course!" Ace exclaimed in relief. "The Enlightenment! An exploration holoship."

"Uh...." Bexley's voice came on clear as day. "Hate to be the bearer of bad news mate but that don't look like no exploration ship I've ever seen."

Ace grabbed onto a support beam as the ship took sudden jerk to the side. The hologram dressed as a christmas tree flickered out.

"Status report!" Ace shouted as he grabbed at the wall to keep himself steady as the ship rocked back and forth. The very air seemed to take on an electric buzz as the ship wove around in what passed for evasive action. "What the hell are you doing up there?!" He fought to keep himself steady.

When he made it to the cockpit, the twins were strapped in. Through the view window the green inky void was lit up like fireworks. "Incoming!" Bexley shouted as Ace jumped into the seat beside him.

"Dive! Dive! Dive!" Jim shouted behind them as Ace took hold of the second set of controls. Together they maneuvered the ship around the field.

"Wildfire! How about that datascan girl!" It was Bexley. Now that Ace was at the helm, he unstrapped and moved to the communications terminal to check the readings. "We've got holo-mines," he reported back as the ship shook violently. "Incoming transmission!" He brought up the broadcast on the central terminal at the flight controls. Ace glanced at it from the corner of his eye.

"I am Captain Hercule Platini of the SS Devastation. You will relinquish the anomaly or you will be blown out of the system."

Bex leaned towards his brother. "Anomaly?"

"Commander Ace Rimmer of the JMC Transport Hopper," Ace replied, firm and full of purpose. "And you'll get it over my dead light bee."

"So be it. Continue fire. We will pull the anomaly from the wreckage if we must."

The transmission was cut. The ship shook as Ace attempted to fly it through the minefield. "Wildfire! If you have any aces up your sleeve old girl, now's the time!"

Data began to flood across Jim's console. Details filling out on the star charts that he hadn't been able to access before. He smiled. "Big orange whirly thing!"

"Where?!"

"Just the other side of that asteroid. You see it?"

"We'll never mak-"

They hit a mine. Just the edge. The ship spun out of control as Ace glitched out, his light bee dropping into the seat he'd been in. Bexley jumped over the communications bank to seize control. "Tell me where to go!" He managed to straighten out their flight path, barely. Their shields were useless against the advanced hologramatic weaponry. But with Ace out of commission, they didn't need to worry so much about the holo mines now.

"See that big rock? Smash that big rock!"

"It ain't been tested yet!"

Jim pulled down a panel from over his head with one hand and fished out his multi-tool from his pocket with the other. "We've got no choice! Just don't get hit again!"

"But-"

"That's a direct order Third Engineer Lister!" He clamped the tool between his teeth as he quickly worked on the wiring behind the panel. Sparks shot from the flight controls, but Bexley held course. Jim finished his rewiring and dropped down, leaving the panel open. His multi-tool was dropped to the floor as he braced for impact. "See the big blue button? Hit the big blue button!"

"Hitting the big blue button, Mister Lister Sir !" Bexley bitterly barked back, reaching forward to slam the big pulsing blue button that had been added after their last supply raid. He watched as all power had been diverted from the shields into the front end of the ship. Forming what could only be described as an energy buffer. "You'd better be smegging right about this or I'll bloody well take his bee and beat you with it!"

If metal could scream, this would be it. Consoles exploded. Jim kept himself braced as best as he could, the panel flopping too and fro above him. "come on... come on..." he quietly repeated to himself like a personal mantra. They slammed straight into the asteroid at full force. It was a dangerous gambit, rerouting the shields from the entire ship into a single concentrated point at the nose of the old starbug. Putting as much power and force behind it as they could to make a sort of energy drill. Or wrecking ball.

The hull groaned under the strain.

"Give it more! More power!"

"I'm givin it all we got! We're smegged!"

The ship shuddered. It screamed.

And into the big, wibbly whirly orange thing behind the asteroid, fell a massive chunk of space rock with a green insectoid looking ship attached.

 o0o

It had fallen from the sky in the dead of night, screaming through the atmosphere and crashing into the shore in a rain of fire and smoke.

The villagers had gathered, and waited, and watched in apprehension as the land mass that had brought the large, oddly shaped green lumpy thing with it had crashed into the deep forests of the island. But the giant rock was far less interesting than the oddity that had come to their beach.

Two men climbed out of the smoldering wreckage which surprisingly was still mostly in one piece.

One tried to stand, but when he did the other grabbed for him, dragging him back down and pinning him to the sand. One hard, angry fist, wrapped around something metallic and glinting in the moonlight, slammed down to punch the other in the face. Once. Twice. Then he, too, fell over.

When all movement had ceased, a cautious native edged closer. Then closer still. When it was close enough to nearly touch the two exhausted, unconscious forms it pulled a small bottle from inside it's vermillion evening jacket and gave them a spritz.

"THIS ONE'S MINE!" He moved purposefully past and spritzed in the direction of the smoking green mass. He spritzed a few times to be sure. "THAT IS ALSO MINE!"

o0o

Jim was the first to wake. He was sore all over, his face throbbing as he tried to take in his surroundings. He felt around, the fabric beneath him was soft and cool. Smooth and under any other circumstances would have been rather inviting.

He touched his face, trying to recall how he had gotten there as his eyes adjusted to the dimness of the chamber. The last thing he remembered was struggling to climb his way out of the cockpit. His arm...  he couldn't move his left arm. He looked down and could barely make out the soft red fabric tied there. And where had his pants gone? For that matter, why was he in just his shorts?

"Ace?" he whispered into the darkness. "Bex?"

He heard a voice whisper nearby. "I should have hit yeh harder."

Relief flooded him as he strained to see in the direction the whisper had come from. "Thank Io you're alive. What about Ace?"

"They took his bee."

"What?"

"Said something about a shiny thing when they took it off me."

"And the ship?"

"Dunno. I think we're marooned thanks to you."

"Better alive than dead."

They lapsed into silence. Jim listened to his brother's breathing, still unable to make out the entirety of the chamber. He was still very tired. They were prisoners, of who he did not know. But for the moment they were alive and safe. All in all, better than they could have been. Cheated certain death once again.

Hours. Days. Jim lost track of how long they had been there in the dark. After a long rest he managed to get up and explore the chamber they were in. His first few steps he learned the floor was covered in soft, plush rugs. He was also terribly alone. They must have come and taken Bexley as Jim slept.

Until a sudden commotion at one side of the room drew his attention. Light streamed in, and he had to shield his eyes from it. A large metal cage door had opened and his brother was thrown inside. "Get the other monkey!"

He was torn between rushing to his brother or fighting back. What good he could do with an injured arm and minimal combat training that had never been put to any real test... well, guess today was the day he'd find out wouldn't it.

"Come get twatted!" he shouted, searching for anything he could use as a weapon as the sharp dressed captors started to close in on him. He found a stick, picking it up to use as a club only to discover it had string tied to one end. It distracted his would-be attackers rather quickly.

He used this distraction to make his way around the edge of the chamber, back towards his brother. He nudged Bexley with his foot. "Get up you gimp." Bexley struggled to stand, and it was only then Jim noticed the plank of wood tied with colorful scarves to his brother's right leg. He wouldn't be able to run. "I said get-"

He never got to finish as Bexley tripped him up and sat up with a full bellied laugh. Jim glared daggers at him from where he had landed on his back, stick with a string in hand.

"Your face! Your smeggin face!"

"But... but- but!"

"We're not prisoners you gimboid. We're honored guests."

"But the.... it's a cage door!"

"They built their village out of shipwrecks! What more did you expect?!"

"But they threw you in!"

"I tripped. You try walking around with a fashionable piece of wood strapped to your broken leg and see how easy it is for you!"

"Ace?"

"Still switched off. They want to know how to make shiny man come out of shiny thing. Told them you could fix it."

When Jim finally got to his feet, clad in only his boxer shorts, he punched Bexley hard as he could, aiming to give him a black eye to match his own.

It turned out, his clothes were taken from him because they clashed with the blood gushing out of his arm at the time. And with everything else in the village.

They had crashed Hopper onto an island paradise called... Fiji, on the planet Fushall.

o0o

It was days before Bexley could get his brother to even sit in the same room as him again. They were also no closer to restoring Ace either. Bexley could only speculate, since he couldn't climb into the damaged ship, and Jim was none too obliging of helping him try and figure out how to fix the problem. Or even see if Wildfire was in once piece in the cargo hold.

When Jim finally did open his mouth to speak to him, it was with an air of hostility and annoyance. "Seeing as we are the only two humans here, and you are unfortunately my only family-"

"In this universe," Bexley added.

"I suppose we must work together to get out of this pickle. First, we need to restore Ace. Second, we need to secure parts for repair of our transport. And lastly, I will need to make a report at the first opportunity documenting your insubordinate behavior."

“Hang on! Who do you think you are? Uncle Rimmeh?! There ain’t nobody ‘round here’s gonna give two figs about your reports mate.”

“And another for back talking.”

"I only rocket blasted the ship into an asteroid because YOU told me to, Jim! If not for you, we wouldn't be in this mess. Stuck on pussy cat island forever. I can only eat so many hot dogs and donuts before I want to explode."

Jim dismissed him with a wave of his hand and a concerted effort to ignore his nattering, returning to the issue at hand. "We need to get into Hopper to inspect Wildfire. Ace's light bee went off when we were hit by a holo mine. It likely scrambled the frequency that links him to his ship."

"Right. And how do you expect me to do that with a bum leg? I'm not exactly running the hundred meter dash here."

"I will go in and do an inspection. As the senior officer here, it is my job to assess our situation and devise a plan to-"

"Oh come off it! Senior officer my arse! Yeh me older brother man, not some hoity toity ship's captain."

"I'll have you know I've passed the exams required for placement as an officer and-"

"And you haven't got your commissions yet mate. Technically, I outrank you. I've actually got a smeggin rank and you don't."

"Because you tampered with the machines before your exam."

"Doesn't matter. According to the JMC computers, I'm an engineer."

" Third engineer," Jim sneered.

Bexley grinned broadly, using a stick he carried as a crutch to get around to help himself up to his feet. "Still more of an officer than you'll ever be. Not my fault reality fell apart before the computers could give you any pips." He hobbled closer to his brother, then past him in the direction of the crash. "Tell you wot," he said when he noticed Jim slowly strolling along behind him, fuming. "The day yeh get yer pips, I'll give yeh the full Rimmeh salute with all the extra pomp an' fuss. Bake yeh a cake, too. Now come on, we're burnin daylight."

o0o

Ace found himself in quite a predicament when he'd come back online.

"Where'd my shiny thing go, shiny man?!"

Apparently, his light bee had become a favorite toy of the indigenous life. And he'd flickered on with the complete Ace Rimmer uniform, much to his distaste.

"Where exactly am I?"

"Ace!" exclaimed a familiar voice. Which meant it was a friendly one at least. He turned his attention away from the cats trying to swat at his shining golden trousers and started in their direction. Halfway to the edge of the village he had started running. Arms thrown wide as he picked up the first boy, Jim? Yes, Jim, and swung him in a circle.

"Thank Io you boys are alive!"

Jim had winced as he was set back down, his arm still sore. Bexley was slower, hobbling up behind his brother. "I think you'd best come inside. I need a stiff drink and we can catch you up."

Ace took in their surroundings as he followed the boys to a row of doors in an oddly shaped building. They stopped long enough for Jim and Bex to glare at one of the locals, puff out their chests and hiss at him before continuing on. "If you don't make yourself look big, they'll just steal all your shiny stuff. Yeh clothes are probably what they was after," Bex explained when they'd gotten inside.

He sat himself down on a chair, similar in design to what they had on the Dwarf. Flashy swaths of fabric were draped everywhere. Jim went to a wall and pulled back a dark green satin curtain, tying it back with a taupe sash. "Welcome to Fiji. There's a fashion show tonight, like there is nearly every week." He then fetched a bottle of something, unlabeled, for Bexley. Ace could smell it from where he stood, and recognized it as the GELF hooch he'd told them to throw out the airlock after they'd smuggled it aboard. He crossed his arms over his chest as Bexley drank deep from the bottle. Belching afterwards.

As much as Ace hated to admit he missed his Lister's antics... he did not like to see some of the man's habits passed down to others.

The kid saw Ace staring at him, no, at the unmarked bottle. "No painkillers here," he said. "Broken leg."

Jim joined him, sitting on an upturned crate draped in blue velvet. Ace didn't need to voice what he'd been thinking. The boys knew. And as Jim was formulating exactly how to word their situation, Bexley instead took the lead. "That mucus coated yellow bellied fruit bowl pulled rank on me and ordered me to use the ship like a battering ram into an asteroid. He'd had this bright idea to make an energy battering ram out of the front end of the ship but we'd never tested it 'cause he knew you'd flip yeh top."

"You WHAT?! You destroyed the ship-"

"Crashed. Not destroyed," Bexley supplied between pulls off his bottle. "Starbugs are made of real tough stuff."

"Nearly killed the crew!"

"It saved our lives, actually. If we'd tried to go around we'd have hit an EMP field and then we'd all be smegged."

As Jim tried to defend his position to Ace, Bexley just sat back, resting his near empty bottle on his thigh and listened with a stupid grin on his face until Jim had finally reached the part about reactivating Ace's light bee. "Wildfire's fine, by the way. Barely a scratch on her. When we hit the holo-mine, it scrambled her link to you. After that she was pissed. Kicked in the doors of their mainframe and stole all the star charts and mission data before wiping their entire navigational system. I think I'm in love."

"You're drunk Bex. Be quiet."

"It's true though. Now we won't be flying blind anymore."

"If we can even fly anymore."

"Soon as me leg's healed up-"

And the two squabbled. Not for the first time since he'd picked them up in that dying dimension they reminded him of home. Of the arguments with Lister, his Lister, over the appropriate tool for the repair of the chicken soup dispenser. Of the spats about his smoking in their room. Of the curry stains on his revision timetables. The long list of reports he'd filed against him for insubordination. The one for mutiny.

Ace shook his head, suppressing a soft laugh under his breath as he slipped from their room and back out into the day. He tilted his head back to let the sun wash over his face with his eyes closed. Despite the numerous cat people wandering about, it was really quite nice. Fresh sea air. A warm climate. Plenty of space for a farm if... No. That wasn't his dream.

He shook the thoughts beginning to swirl in the front of his mind, banishing them back into the box he kept them locked in. If there were felis sapiens, that meant somehow, somewhere there was a Dave Lister who smuggled a pregnant cat aboard a Red Dwarf. Somewhere, out there in the vast green of space, were the means to possibly repair the Holly Hop Drive. Perhaps even a Rimmer that could be convinced to replace him if the man hadn't been contacted about it long before his own tenure started.

Ace put himself into soft light mode so he could move quicker. Move faster without the problem of simulated matter blocking his path. It wasn't hard, making the straight line through the village and into the surrounding forest when you could pass through nearly anything. He'd made his way to the beach, to the wreckage of their ship.

Battered and beaten, but unbroken. Starbugs were made out of the stuff the little dolls found in plane crashes were made from. He only hoped the inside was made of just as sturdy stuff.

Hours passed as he worked inside the transport that had been their home for the last year. Digging his way through a small path that, he assumed, must have been made by the boys. It was cleared just enough for someone their size to get through, but not much else. He'd gone to the cockpit first, having to climb the floor grating almost like a ladder in order to reach the controls. Scorch marks and burned wiring. The scent of smoke and burning plastic still hung heavy in the air. He searched over the flight console in desperation until he found it. Charred around the edges. The white bottom of the photo nearly melted away. Beneath the soot, the dark, smiling face still beamed at him. He snatched it up and shoved it in the inner pocket of his hard light flight jacket. Taking stock of the cockpit, he admitted he'd seen worse. Had fixed worse. But that was the problem... finding the parts to fix the old junk heap.

He let go of his hold on a flight seat and let gravity pull him downward at the steep angle, almost surfing to the bottom. The bug had landed awkwardly. The front end twisted and bent at an angle compared to the rest of the ship. which had fallen on its side, the midsection and front end having come apart, he guessed, somewhere in the atmosphere. Barely held on by the clamping mechanism that had short circuited and refused to allow the ship to separate.

Ace slogged through the ship once again, making for the back end, for the cargo hold. Being a hologramatic entity consisting of hard light, not for the first time he was grateful he could shut off his pain receptors, allowing him to use his enhanced strength unhindered by the sensations of strain and exhaustion. As he dug his way through the debris - he could feel her reaching out to him from the other side.

His link to his ship growing stronger and stronger until he caught the first sight of old red and sexy. He worked harder; he worked faster. Unable to shift everything, even he had his limitations, but he had been able to get just enough moved so he could reach the cockpit hatch. So he could clear it away and open her up.

"Took your sweet time, didn't you Ace," her normally sultry voice snapped bitterly. "I'd just about given up you ever showing your face 'round 'ere again. You should thank me for turning you back on. After the effects of the scrambler wore off that is. But no, you let me sit here for days on end, alone in this dank hole."

"What are you on about?! And why do you sound like-"

"Because flyboy, I had to resort to my backup computer. Not all Ace Rimmers like a sexy seductress you know. Some like a little bit of rough 'round the edges kinda gal. The kinda gal you don't take home to mum because she's the kinda gal who's gonna insult your sisters, chug your lager, and belch out the star spangled banner."

"Oh good lord..." Ace muttered under his breath. "Which one of me did this to your personality matrix and for the love of Io why?"

"What? Sometimes when you leave home, you wanna be reminded of the totty you leave behind. S'why you take that picture with you everywhere. Tacking it up in my cockpit. Giving it tender strokes that rightly should have been tender strokes on me flight stick instead of on that smegging picture." The computer seemed to huff at him in annoyance. "Come on then, shift it. Get me the hell out of here."

His eye twitched uncontrollably through her entire spiel. "I do not- I don't-"

"You've been pining for him. It's why you wanna hand me off. I know it. You spineless coward can't hack it out here. And you know what? You're not even supposed to be here you know."

He balked at her words. "What's THAT supposed to mean?!"

"Time flows different in some dimensions, yeah. Well, when the last Ace was injured and looking for a replacement, you weren't even on the list. Your dimension was nearest, and I didn't want to go. But he didn't have the time to be picky."

"There was a list?! There's a list I can just pull up and choose from?! All this time and you didn't bother to tell me?!"

"Because you can't access the list. The next Rimmer on the list is one we can't get to. Because you're here and he's there ."

"Now what's THAT supposed to mean!?"

She audibly huffed at him. "What d'ya think it means, Ace." Her computerized voice sneered at him. "We came to your dimension at the wrong time, before the real Arnie J. was ready to be picked. I'm tired of holograms all the time. I want a real man, Ace. I want to feel fleshy fingers stroking my buttons. Monitor life signs and worry if he'll make it out of the battle alive. The thrill of panic and urgency that only living people experience! And I can't go get him, because you're here. And HE'S there!"

Ace held onto the hatch of the cockpit, deciding whether or not to drop down into the seat to try and sort out the problems with the computer first, or to try and dislodge her enough to get her out of the wreckage.

"I've got a message for you, Ace. Audio only. My visual circuits need retooling."

He bit his tongue, biting back his words of anger at his computer. She was out of sorts. A backup. She didn't know what she was saying. "Punch it up," he said quietly, his thoughts simmering just below the surface.

"I've fast forwarded through the rest of the boring bits," she replied before playing the message. “You really like to hear yourself talk, don’t you.”

He heard his own voice, punctuated by static. "So... you've met Debbie. You'll never get on. Doesn't matter. Your idiot nephews slammed into an asteroid like a battering ram after you were hit with a lightwave scrambler off a holo-mine. Had they attempted to fly around it, the SS Devastation's EMP bombs would have shut down all power, including life support. You're probably wondering how they survived and where you are. You are on the island of Fiji, one of four islands of the planet Fushall. No doubt by now you have seen the locals, so need to go into what they are. The asteroid started to break up when Hopper attempted to drill through it. Part of that asteroid came with you, crashing into the island you are now on. The asteroid has opened a subterranean cave system. I say cave system but... this planet was at one time nothing but ocean and atmosphere. When the cats came, their arks were turned into islands. You can start searching the cave system for older parts to work on repairs. But you need to leave Fushall and Hopper behind for a time to finish the checklist."

"Like smeg I will."

"You say that now, but there was a reason the checklist was so long. Always plan ahead, Rimsey. Plan ahead and you'll find that the bazookoids in the crew cabins can be repurposed into welding torches with the right multi-tool."


	3. Revelations

 

Plan ahead. That's what he'd told himself. To plan ahead. That's what The Checklist had been about. Tools. Weapons. Spare parts. And baubles for bribery.

If he could reach through time and space, he would attempt to choke himself to death over this. He knew it would have no effect, since holograms didn't need to breathe, but it had been the principle of the matter. Perhaps if he became angry enough now to induce a migraine, he could sustain it long enough until he reached that point in his existence to really annoy the smeg out of himself later.

No matter. The baubles had been useful in bribing the local population into helping him shift the debris enough to work Wildfire out of the cargo hold.

Once she had been out, and fully active, he had been able to use her to tow the ship further inland, and to scan it for further insight into the damages.

The cat people had gathered to watch the proceedings with mild interest after having been bribed with shiny baubles to help clear the debris for Wildfire's release. Knowing of their vanity beforehand had it's uses... A shiny man giving them shiny things. It just sort of worked in it's strange way.

The night Hopper had finally been stabilized on solid ground, with the cockpit twisted back into some semblance of correct direction the cats had their weekly fashion show. Many things were spritzed as belonging to one cat or another. Many fish and other odd sea creatures were pulled from the waters and served up to one and all as the village had celebrated the new trend that was all the rage - finding some way to incorporate the baubles into their clothing and accessories as much as possible.

The cats partied long into the night along the shore and well back into the village proper. Bexley had been forced to call it an early night, the pain in his leg becoming too much for him to handle. He now had a large plaster shell on his leg, made from medical foam Ace kept on his ship for emergencies. You never knew when your pretty damsel would need to be patched up before being sent back to her rich parents. Jim had returned from taking his brother back to their shared room and whispered in Ace's ear to follow him.

Ace was thankful for the excuse to disengage the pawing affections of the cat women who'd decided to fawn over this strange, exotic creature that was the 'shiny golden one'. Once more he heard at his back the swooning sighs of "What a guy."

Disengaged from the revelry at last, Ace and Jim walked into the forest, but he noticed they were walking away from the village. "The asteroid chunk that came down with us," he said. "The impact should have wiped out the entire island and everything on it. But it didn't," Jim said solemnly. "The angle, the velocity... and our momentum alone should have completely destroyed Hopper. We shouldn't be alive."

"You shouldn't have been able to crack that asteroid."

"We didn't. Something else did. I don't know what, I don't know how. But I'm sure there was something else out there."

"What I don't understand is why would you make the call to slam into the asteroid in the first place? It was suicide."

Jim was silent as he walked along, eyes turned downward to the dirt path and his hands deep in the pocket of his cargo shorts. Before he realized what he was doing, Ace reached out and put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. Jim looked up at him, but there wasn't much to see of the living one's face. Only a soft glow from Ace's own hologramatic presence. Slowly, the edges of a smile crept into Jim's face as he gave a nod. "Dad... would have wanted us to go out the same way we came in. Kicking and screaming," he said.

"Maybe," Ace replied, patting his shoulder. "What you did was reckless and stupid."

"And when we get to your Red Dwarf, you can court-martial me for it." He shrugged Ace's hand off his shoulder and started down the path again. "Come on. You need to see what Bex and I found earlier today." Jim quickened his pace, but did not stray far from Ace, not wanting to lose what little light the hologram's presence afforded him in the darkness.

o0o

Bexley sat with his leg propped up on a barrel. A couple of upturned crates sat in front of him, pieces of machines and accessories scattered about. His brother had scavenged an electronic data pad from Hopper's wreck and Ace had synced it up with the Wildfire. Together the pair of them were sorting through The Checklist.

"I don't get what the point of all this is supposed to be for. Without a ship there's no reason to keep on with this. It's hopeless." He sat back in his chair with a groan. His head tilted back to stare at the ceiling. Above him was a whirlwind of color. Of scent.

When they had arrived, after claiming them as property one of the cats had pulled them away from where they'd collapsed beside the ship. Bexley was the first to wake in the sick chamber - the dark, cool place where some of the cats would go to hide when they didn't feel well - and had been tended to. They said he smelled like the "Holy Stupid One". Sure, he'd played a terrible prank on his brother. But it was far better than what he'd wanted to do when he first came to. He'd wanted to beat Jim senseless as he had when he'd crawled out of the wreck after him.

But now? His resentment still simmered, but ultimately he was the one at the controls. He was the one that trusted his brother knew what he was doing. Had flown them face first into the asteroid.

"Fire, old gal," he said loud enough for the data pad to pick up his voice.

"Please," the Wildfire's computer said back to him. "Call me Deb. Or Debbie. Whatever you like."

He wasn't exactly thrilled with the computer's backup personality matrix, but he supposed it could have been worse. "Have you cracked those mission logs yet?"

"Why'd you want to see those for, kiddo?"

"They came on board lookin for somethin'. Some anomaly or somesuch."

"Oh yeah... that. They never found us, did they. You clever boys. Making the ship's shields out of tachyon field generators. Completely shielded you from their scans. I don't know how they knew to look for inter-dimensional causality frequencies. But it was a bit odd that a science ship was converted to a war ship."

As she had spoken to him, the little screen was populated with files. He need only used a stylus to select the ones he wished to look at. Or to scroll down further for more. He'd asked her to make the data so simple to find and access that a monkey could do it. Well, this was the fruit of her labors. Scrolling through, the tip of his tongue poking out the corner of his mouth as he skimmed through documents and tried to figure out what it was he was even looking for, he finally saw it. "Project Wildfire..." he said, double tapping the stylus to the screen and opening the file. An outline filled in before his eyes. The more he read, the more his concern grew. "Debbie?" he asked at last when he'd stopped scrolling through the document. A picture of his dad who wasn't his dad looking back at him.

The man was unlike any of the pictures he had ever seen. Another David Lister, from another universe. Short cropped hair, and actually wearing a non-curry stained uniform. Clean shaven except for a mustache on his face. "First Officer David Lister-Rimmer, Red Dwarf..." He kept scrolling down. Another one. Another Lister. Spectacles and an engineer's cap. "David 'Spanners' Lister, Space Corps Base, Mimas?"... More and more as he went through. The same face, in different expressions. Different phases of life. Some black and white, some color. Others... others had large, bold brands of X covering the face in the center. Daves and Debs. Some Daniels. There was even a Davina... He didn't think he'd ever see his dad in drag until he'd scrolled quickly past that one.

"But... But I don't understand. Why?"

"Well how else would you lure hoity toity fly-boy space adventurer Ace Rimmer into a trap?"

"Bait."

"You betcha."

"So what's the goal here? What's the end game?"

"I dunno. But I'm sure it'll be fun finding out," the Wildfire computer replied. Bexley closed out the file and looked through the data again.

"I need to find something, anything about the anomaly they were looking for."

"Well..." the disembodied voice replied, summoning up another file for him. "I did find this when I made the interface for you."

"Ace's service record? What does this have to do with anything?"

"Just look."

He sat reading through the file. Much as the other one, it had started out with an outline of information. There had been a period of eight years missing after the details of the Dimension Jump Drive test. He kept scrolling. And scrolling... And scrolling. Each time a dimension jump was recorded, Ace had just concluded an epic feat no one could have survived. "Did you beam all your flight information back to your home dimension?"

"It's how I was programmed. It was a test flight, to see if it could work or not. They never expected Ace to live so long. The real Ace met the one you've got now, I can tell you that easy enough. He was the first one Ace met. I'm programmed to find other versions of my pilot, as a sort of mission directive for him so the limits of the Dimension Jump drive can be tested out fully. I was never meant to keep flying this long."

He had scrolled through a few thousand years worth of information and knew he still had thousands, if not millions more to go. Bexley let the data pad rest in his lap. "What are you trying to tell me, Debbie?"

"Well, my primary personality matrix is a tart, but she's a military tart through and through. She's just been following orders, really. Once the simulants took over the first Ace's home dimension, humanity had just perfected the Dimension Jump technology based on all the data that was sent back from Ace's adventures. They got bit power hungry. Tried to annex dimensions for resources, but ended up starting more wars than they knew what to do with. Ultimately it was agreed in a peace treaty that if they could just stop Ace Rimmer and his ship, they could solve everyone's problems."

"...And that's why they needed bait."

"Exactly."

"But WHY all the Listers? What about his parents? His brothers and sisters? He's got a family, yeah?"

"Aces don't become Ace because they have a family they like. They put on the wig because they're trying to run away from something. Or someone. Take me for instance. I'm on my backup personality matrix. Because the other one's... well, let's just say it'll be a while before she gets put back online. The tart."

Bexley groaned. "Yes, she's a tart. You've said that."

"But me, I'm not a tart. Now Dave... Dave's a tart. A right trollop. Not exactly hard to pull, if you get my drift."

"Oi! That's me dad you're talking about! You get back on about yourself and leave him out of it!"

"Right right...." she said, and the data pad in his lap beeped at him before the screen started scrolling rapidly down. A segment of text was highlighted, then it zoomed in. Bexley picked it up and watched the screen as it kept selecting segments and then enlarging them until the computer had found what she was looking for. A simulated double tap highlighted a file name and a video image began to play. A body dropped into the cockpit of the Wildfire on the screen. The furred collar and golden flight jacket looked strange on a woman's body. Another Ace? She was frantic.

 

> _"Smeg! He didn't show me how to use the smegging controls yet! Computer!"_
> 
> _"Welcome back, Ace," the sultry seductress of a computer purred. "Where do you want to go today?"_
> 
> _"Anywhere but here. Just get me out of here!"_
> 
> _An explosion somewhere outside the ship as the cockpit hatch closed. The engines roared to life._

 

Bexley held the data pad closer to his face. The woman was frantic. Flipping switches and turning knobs before finally the ship took off. The woman on the screen covered her face, letting out a deep, mournful wail. "What is this?" he whispered as he watched the woman, this new Ace, breaking down without realizing she had been recorded. The woman threw her head back, her sobs shaking through her body. He heard the computer's voice in the video again.

 

> _"Ace?"_
> 
> _"Leave me the hell alone!"_
> 
> _"Ace, it was for the best."_
> 
> _"Smeg off!"_
> 
> _"There was nothing you could do, Ace."_
> 
> _"I said smeg off!" the woman roared angrily, thumping the console with her fist before she rose and left the cockpit, disappearing from sight behind the flight chair._

 

Bexley was about to ask what had happened when the video seemed to end. But like some of his own Ace's videos messages it had merely been a sort of information buffer before another video began, once more in the cockpit of Wildfire.

 

> _"Ship's log... It's been eighteen months since Deb and the boys... no. No. Edit that bit out later. Start again... Ship's log. It has been eighteen months since I took over command of the Wildfire from the previous Ace Rimmer. He had been rather surprised at the time to find that I was a woman, and intrigued that he was not the first male version of myself I had met. I liked the other one better. I met another me today. His wife was lovely. He'd become a gardener on Titan. Was quite a shock, let me tell you. That wife of his though... oh she had legs for miles. And a mean right hook. Boxing champion. With arms like those, I bet she is... Alas, duty called. Another swooning prince in need of rescuing. I'd run off and get captured by the Ruskies, too, if my bride to be looked like she'd crawled out of a swamp just that morning._
> 
> _"I did have the chance to overhaul the Wildfire's engines, and upgrade the old girl's shielding. No luck on the dimension lock yet... If only I could get back. See if maybe... See if I can build another portal cannon. See if they're still in the mirror universe. As it stands right now, the best I have is this." She held up a shining silver disk. "I had it knocked up based on Deb's personality disk from the Dwarf. She didn't know I nicked it for the AR... well, the reason doesn't matter. When I sent Prince Bonjelo back to his parents they offered me anything I wanted. Backup personality matrix. I don't trust the smegger already loaded in. She'll probably delete this as well. I had better back it up on something before she gets the opportunity."_
> 
>  

"Is that... Is that who I think it is?"

"Yeah. She's my favorite. She installed me in. Sentimental old girl. You'll like this next bit." The computer fast forwarded through a bit of static before allowing it to play one more time. The image was shaky.

 

> _"The bastards! I found a way around the lock, but it was... the bastards! I don't know how. I don't know why or when or what's-" The screen shook even more as the ship was rocked by an explosion. "I've set the ship to find the next Rimmer in the sequence. I don't think I'll survive this one old pet... Whoever you are. Whichever me you are watching this. You've got two years. Two years before they'll track down the Wildfire. Two years is all you get before they send out the dogs. Saving people... stopping wars... it doesn't matter anymore. We have to stop them from ripping reality apart. I'm sealing off Dimension One. It won't do much, but it may stop the data flow. It might buy you more time."_
> 
> _The ship was hit again. Sparks flew up into her face, but she didn't care._
> 
> _"Dimension 165 was a set up. The Agonoids had Spanners. It wasn't a Neutron Ta-"_

 

The video cut off.

Bexley sat in silence, staring at the screen of his data pad. He wasn't sure if it was the food and fine wine from the feline celebrations or his horror and revulsion as the screen returned to the service record, now on automatic scroll, as the reason he wanted to vomit. Lists of numbers. All with the prefix of D. Numbers crossed out. Beside them he read phrases like _Missing In Action_ and _Killed in Action_. As the list went further on the words _assassination_ and _execution_ made themselves far more prevalent. At last the list of millions of dimensions and millions of numbers stopped.

"Ace Rimmer... Dimension Two-B. Hard-Light. _Execution_. Dimension Two-C. Hard-Light. _Assassination_. Dimension Two-A-1. Hard-Light. _Unknown_. Dimension Two-A-2. Human. _Eligible_." he whispered to the empty room. "Debbie? The Ace from the video... who was she?"

"Ace Rimmer Dimension Two-B. Arlene Judy Rimmer, Second Technician aboard JMC Ship Red Dwarf. Wife of Deb Lister, step-father of Jim Speed Lister and Bexley Speed Lister."

"Did... she said Deb and the boys... but we're... We're here. Aren't we?"

"You are here. But you were also there. And in many other dimensions. I like to think they're safe, living out their lives in that mirror universe with the mirror version of Arlene. I'd bet she was ship's captain there."

It was a lot to take in. And Bexley had wished he'd paid more attention to where Jim had hidden the GELF hooch supply. Amidst the information overload, which he knew would take him days, possibly weeks to fully process through, one niggling little detail kept bothering him. "Hang on, Debbie. When you say _step-father_ , do you mean because she wasn't our mum, so it's the default in the computers or something?"

"No Bexley. I mean exactly that. Arlene Judy Rimmer, in her dimension, is the step-father of your alternate self."

"That doesn't make any sense though, does it? Did she used to be a man or something?"

"No Bexley. Arlene Judy Rimmer was, and always had been, a woman. In her dimension, it's the men who get pregnant. The men who carry the babies."

He paled, the bile threatening to rise back up in the back of his throat. "So... about those anomalies..." he said, trying not to think too hard about it.

o0o

Jim had led Ace near the asteroid chunk landing site. "We think they had some sort of experimental terraforming device on-board which triggered when the ships crashed," Jim said excitedly as he ran ahead of him. "That's why there's trees and a good climate." He did not go directly to the crater site, but instead signaled for Ace to come join him at a small structure. If he had to call it something, the word would be gazebo.

"What's all this abou..."

As his hologramatic form lit up the small enclosure, he saw it. A glass case with a crumbling box inside. An old London Jets t-shirt and a laundry list lining the bottom. "Is that..."

"The sacred directions to finding Cloister and Fushall?" Jim finished for him. Ace nodded.

"When we get back to my dimension, you don't say a single word to that foul smelling louse infested lichen covered sweat stain, do you understand me. Not one word."

"Make me an officer and we've got a deal."

"You're joking."

"You're a commander. Highest ranking officer in our crew. Make me an officer, higher rank than Bexley, and I won't tell your boyfriend about the cat people who found Fushall."

Ace spluttered. "He's- I'm- We weren't-"

Jim grinned. "Rimmer Directive 77. If nothing else works, why not try blackmail?"

"I knew there were reasons I liked your brother better..." he muttered. "I'll consider it. But I make no promises."

The pair of them continued to explore the area, as dawn approached and they no longer needed to rely on Ace's natural glow, the reluctant space hero realized the entire grounds had been turned into a sort of memorial garden. Dotted about the garden had been informational scent markers. Of all the times he'd "read" the Cat to human dictionary, he didn't retain much. But some of the scents he did recognize. No admittance. Out of shampoo.

He sniffed at a post again and frowned. "Danger?"

"If this is where they first landed," Jim said as he ran his fingers over the post marker Ace had sniffed a few times, just to be sure he understood. "Maybe it was a way to keep any children from going back to the familiar ships. Touch down here and make a clear boundary of what is and isn't safe. That's what I'd do if it were me."

"Cats don't just mark something as a danger arbitrarily, and least of all for the benefit of others. Something here frightened them. Take a look around, miladdo. This place hasn't seen much foot traffic for decades. I'd wager for a few centuries."

"So who's been doing the hedges then?"

Ace shrugged. "Lister told me once of an old man he'd found in the lower decks of the ship. A cat priest of sorts. Maybe tending this memorial garden is part of their duties."

"I don't think I saw anything looking like a priest around here."

"All dead then. But something here did frighten them enough to encourage them to keep away." Ace looked around the area once more, trying to find any clues that could tell him more. The crater... Wildfire... Debbie, had told him the asteroid had reopened an ancient cave system. The internal corridors of the ships that made up the islands. "We need to get back to the village," he said, grabbing Jim roughly by the arm and dragging him across the gardens. Back the way they had come. His bravado faltered, only just, as the true Rimmer shone through in his haste to leave. His hurried steps to get the smeg out of there.

When he released Jim's arm, having left the clearing, he set a brutal pace back down the path, trusting that Jim followed behind him.

o0o

Bexley hadn't gotten any sleep. Dawn streamed in through the open window as he hobbled on his make-shift crutch around the room. He'd borrowed some fabric pens and grease pencils from his neighbor, trading a small silver chain for a roll of solid yellow fabric and his wristwatch for a pair of pinking shears to keep the edges from unraveling.

Now large swaths of yellow fabric hung from as high as he could reach on the walls. Diagrams and notations in every conceivable space. Twine connected one area to another. One concept and idea to the next. He worked to distract himself from the pain in his leg. From the pain in his neck and back from the crash.

To distract his mind from those moments of abject terror after they'd pushed through and fell into the wormhole in an attempt to escape the reach of the S.S. Devastation. Moved by fear and purpose and rage and hope. And in no small way fueled by the stash of liquor Jim had hidden away in a wall panel he'd found when tacking up the fabric.

He ducked and wove and hobbled around, consulting the data pad and scribbling away. When one utensil had been used up, he merely threw it over his shoulder and fished another from the pouch he'd slung across his chest, having it hang off his hip.

Grease stained his hands and wrists, had caked beneath his nails and ink smeared across his face and clothes as he had worked. He worked on figuring out the repairs. Figuring out what to do with those things on the smegging list. Saw how the missing pieces fit into the larger, yet still unfinished and half-hidden plan that drove them all towards their ultimate goal. To return to Ace's dimension. To find a place to settle down. To have a family and a home. He had worked to drive out the terror. To drive out thoughts of the revelations Wildfire... no, Debbie, had given him.

When Jim and Ace had burst through the door well after dawn, their faces red and having to catch their breath from the run back to the village, they found Bexley laying on his back in the floor, staring up at the ceiling and laughing. Bottles of GELF Hooch littered the floor with grease pencil stubs and dried out, used up fabric markers. A web of string and twine tying walls of yellow together. Corks, wads of paper, bits of metal junk tied up in the strings at seemingly odd places along the way.

"What the smeg? He’s gone space crazy," Jim whispered as he stepped cautiously into the room he shared with his brother. Ace followed him inside, stepping over discarded junk as he examined the boy's work. He plucked a string, and watched as it bounced the bottle cap tied part way into it. The cap bounced, hitting another string, causing it to vibrate. A domino effect as different parts of the web would take up the vibration in the chain reaction.

"Bex?"

Bexley continued to laugh, stopping only long enough to lift his head and put a nearly empty bottle to his lips as the vibrations in the twine finally stopped. "I've worked out the repairs."

Jim carefully stepped through the string and twine web, staring at the yellow fabric draped upon their walls in shock. A diagram of the Holly Hop Drive. Another diagram of Wildfire's inner workings. Of Hopper's engines and deflector shields. "You did all of this? Alone? In one night?" he asked in true astonishment.

Ace glanced at the boy from the corner of his eye, laying in the floor and drinking. His laughter a symptom of hysteria. He stopped to examine a very detailed diagram of the Enlightenment, as he had known the holoship to be. Compared to the S.S. Devastation they had encountered before the crash. Nearly identical, save for the addition of holo canons and other weaponry. He found a diagram of Hopper, like many others scattered in and among the boy's notes for all to see. He nearly tripped over the abandoned data pad. He picked it up and looked through what Bexley had been doing.

"What is this?"

"What's what?" Jim shouted so he could be heard over his brother's laughter. Ace waved him over and showed it to him. Ace held the data pad up to compare it to the mess of strings. Jim looked at the monitor then to the strings and back again. "Is that what I think it is?"

"It's a star map. But it's not... It doesn't look like a standard Navicomp chart. It's too complex."

They didn't notice when Bexley had stopped laughing. Not until they had stopped murmuring between them while trying to work out what they were actually looking at.

"Debbie, tell them," Bexley said from the floor, finishing off his bottle and closing his eyes.

The Wildfire's backup personality matrix took control of the monitor on the data pad. Rotating the chart as they moved around to line it up with the physical model in the room. "I'm not the only ship, you know. You can repair your Holly Hop Drive using parts from my sister ship Slipstream. According to the ship logs of the twenty-seventh Ace Rimmer a second ship was launched without authorization from Dimension One. It was last seen in Dimension 2097, where an Ace Rimmer died heroically in an attempt to save the crew of the Red Dwarf aboard Starbug from Argonoid attack. Slipstream jumped to follow, but malfunctioned. Both she, and her pilot, are assumed to have fallen out of causality."

"What does that even mean?" Jim asked.

If Ace had blood, it would have been running cold through his equally non-existent veins. "Wildfire-"

"Debbie," the computer corrected.

"Yes, alright, Debbie. When a entity falls out of causality, does that make them then an anomaly? They cease to exist in space as well as time?"

"Yes, Ace."

"So the Devastation detected an anomaly, assumed it to be the Slipstream, and wanted it for themselves. But why would the holoship be a warship? What practical purpose would an offensive holoship have?"

Debbie thought on this. It had been a question Bexley had posed to her in the night. Consulting her data-banks and those she had ripped from the enemy ship before her primary personality matrix had been so rudely kicked around a bit, she was unsure if she could find a solution. "I suppose," the computer began. "Just supposin it was self preservation. The causality lines here are similar to D-2097 from what I can see. The Agonoids, what you would call Simulants, rose up in rebellion and the humans fought back. The humans we've met since we got here are more aggressive than any Ace and I ever came across. This may be the key difference in the two dimensions. The only reason one side would be after trans-dimensional travel is because the other side already has it."

Bexley lay there, listening to his brother and Ace ask Debbie the many questions he himself had during his long night's work. And as he heard the answers again, the more he missed the Red Dwarf and his glitchy uncle. The videos of his dad - happy and laughing with his friends at the ship's bar. That song he hummed as he prepped the boys for the do-it-yourself chronon stabilizer Holly had walked him through building out of a stasis chamber. The same song he'd sung to them, off-key, as an impromptu lullaby in the short time they'd had together.

He hadn't realized he'd been humming it, too.

Ace had heard the humming from the center of the room, causing his grip on the data pad to tighten. "Get some sleep," he told Jim as he handed it over, the casing showing a hairline crack from where his hands had held it. "I'm going back to Hopper. The black box might tell us more about our current situation."

"Ace-" Jim called after him, but Ace had already gone, his legs carrying him quickly through the sunlit village, back towards the beach.

His light bee simulated a rapid heartbeat and the pounding in his head. There were no Chinese grinding balls to distract him from his own thoughts this time. No clone uprising. No prison cell to hide him away - both punishing him but also keeping him safe from the world around him. There was no Lister to get on his nerves, push him to his breaking point of aggravation. No curry breath to give him purpose, to keep him sane all these years as he struggled to cope with still existing despite having died.

"Stupid Lister and his stupid humming."


	4. Chaos

They had used Wildfire to scan the islands in order to get a map of the subterranean tunnel system. The trio had learned two of the remaining three islands were inhabited with slightly more intelligent life. Ones who did not dabble in affairs of the worshipers of Cloister the Stupid, for it was Clister the Goit who had been the one true savior of the Holy Mother.

The Clister faction, Ace had learned, were those responsible for building the great arks and had brokered peace between the blue hat and the red had armies. The theological differences between the followers of Cloister and the followers of Clister were by far like night and day.

For one, the followers of Cloister valued stupidity as their highest virtue. Selfishness and laziness were also considered good virtues among their island. They also spelled the planet's name differently from their Clister faction counterparts, including an SH instead of a CH and a double L at the end rather than a single. This discrepancy had, apparently, been the primary reason the Clister and Cloister sects had separated from one another. Those who followed Clister the Goit valued compassion and cooperation, adoration for Rastabilly Skank, and practical jokes. They also had an explanation for why they were stranded on an ocean planet.

The followers of Cloister had hit an asteroid, and the followers of Clister had turned around to rescue them. Once free of the asteroid, the idiot Cloisters had steered them directly back into the asteroid. The ships damaged, they had fallen, like the Hopper crew, into the wormhole.

It made sense when they all thought about their two respective versions of the Cat. He had called Lister "Cloister" after all...

They had done all they could, repairing the ship piece by piece according to Bexley's diagrams and calculations. It had been no easy feat foraging in the subterranean corridors of the island-ships, stripping them of sheet metal panels, computers, weapons, tools.

Ace likened the process to an archeological excavations from Earth's history. A trove of useless cat artifacts mixed in with the patchwork of Red Dwarf and internally manufactured items the felis sapiens had used to build their ships.

Attempting to precision cut with a modified bazookoid was like taking a sledgehammer to a drywall nail in a soft piece of buttered bread. Far too much power for a process and purpose it had never been intended to be used for.

Bexley, unable to perform much of the physical labor himself while his leg continued to heal, had taken command of the project. He had even made a timetable that would put his own time tables for revisions to shame. These engineering time tables were works of perfection, the boy having taken the extra time to not simply color them in as Ace would have but rather to cut the colored squares out of cloth, sew them together by hand, and then hand stitch the lettering in while sitting in his workshop.

Ace had taken Wildfire out often, searching the surrounding system for signs of the wormhole they had fallen through. He did not like leaving the boys behind on Fushall, but the need for fuel and supplies they just could not dig out of the wrecks was great.

He tried not to stray too far, leaving for no more than a week at a time. With Wildfire's faster-than-light capability, he could cover great distances. But this region of space had been remote. The only signs of life had been the cats, and themselves. Not even a GELF or a rogue droid.

That was... until...

"Ace, we've found something. A derelict."

"Ident?"

"Scans indicate Earth ship. Sixty-second century."

"That can't be right. Run it again," Ace said as he moved to the cockpit. He stood, one arm bent and resting on the back of the seat as he leaned in to get a look out the window.

"It says what it says, Ace."

"I supposed it's too much to ask if there's life on board."

"The computers are a patchwork job. I can hardly make sense of it. There's too many idents-"

"Debbie," he said in a warning tone.

"Ah. Finally. Got one. Do you even know what it's like havin to sift through seventeen different ship board computers 'till yah finally get one with a full name?"

"No, but I'm sure you'll tell me..."

"This is the Ark ship Noah."

Ace laughed. "Oh, Noah's Ark! Isn't that just dandy. I suppose there's two of every creature on Earth aboard."

"Not as such, no. There could be, though. The computers show there's a cloning facility on board. Genetic template depositories for all sorts of things. From flora to fauna."

This piqued his interest as he turned the seat so he may sit. Spinning the chair forward he punched in the landing sequence. "This means it'll have things we can use."

"I can hardly carry a full complement of genetic engineering equipment-"

"But you can scan the equipment. Small, important components can be stowed in my quarters and I'll just sit up here and stroke your buttons all the way back to Fushall."

Debbie sighed in contentment at the thought of her buttons getting a good stroking before the computer simulated a cough. "Well, that I could do, yeah. That boy of yours is a whiz when it comes to sorting out mechanicals and gadgets. What you thinking? Getting home and making yourself a new body?"

The thought had crossed his mind. He was sure there were things back home, back on Starbug or even the Dwarf if they ever caught up with her... personal belongings with his DNA all over them... but it would be impossible. He would need to mind-patch his hologramatic self into the new body. Since his hologram was a replica of himself, and his hologram could not sustain mind-patches for longer than a few hours the thought had been an exercise in futility.

No, his thoughts lay with Lister, his Lister. His Red Dwarf. If there truly were a machine on that derelict that he could replicate in his own dimension, they could find an empty world and take it there. A dead S3 world and bring it back to life and make a new Earth. With new humans. Surely there were enough items on the Dwarf, if they could find her, from enough different crew members they could start again. Surely, he could finally remove the storm cloud of guilt that had followed him since Holly first switched him on. He had done it once already with Rimmerworld. Certainly his paradise had it's problems. Namely it had been inhabited by nothing but clones of himself, but he had learned from the terrifying experience. Never clone himself.

"I won't lie," he said at last. "It's mighty appealing. But there's more important matters to deal with first. Open up an air lock Debbie. We're going in."

o0o

His leg hadn't healed properly. It gave him pain when he spent too much time on it, moving about and tending to his duties. He wore a homemade metal brace to keep his leg from giving out under him after long hours toiling away in his workshop or in the engines of Hopper.

He was angry. He was bitter. He was hardened.

It had been three and a half years since Ace had left them, abandoned them on Fushall. In that time the Cloisters had made the twins advisors to their leaders, seeing as they could build and fix things. Jim had decided to settle down. But not Bexley. He itched to see the stars again. He dreamed of the vast green. He never stopped working on their ship. He never gave up. Fiji was nice and all, but he longed for that empty void and it's gaping maw into which he and his brother had been born.

When Ace hadn't come back after a week, he had started to worry. After three, he and James had scavenged the bowels of the shipwreck islands, stealing what components they could for anything they could use for communication. Old power cells were tested and taken, put to use to boost signals and scans, trying harder and harder to push through the thick atmosphere. To reach out like a beacon, to bring him back.

After the first year, the natives had started slacking off in their aid. After two, Jim had finally given up ever leaving the islands.

After two and a half, Bexley had started building a large turret, spending days and a time dragging wooden carts through the forest from the asteroid crater, using it as his access point to find the parts he needed to make a canon.

Jim had watched his brother toil away his days and it broke his heart to watch him. They were fools for thinking Ace would help them. Fools for believing in a hero who, they knew, to be a scrawny, useless coward at his core. He'd tried to talk his brother out of his madness, only to be shoved aside. Spat on. Hated.

So instead he had watched, and he waited for the inevitable failure. Waited for his brother to finally come to his senses and accept the fact that they would never be able to leave...

Or so he had believed into their third year of life among the cats.

So he had believed until he saw the bright, brilliant fire streaking across the sky and his brother's voice roaring with anger and rage as in the distance, off the coast of Fiji, a freighter ship crashed down into the water. When he had heard the ominous crack in the air, he had run outside to see what had happened. The villagers, curious by their very nature, had sniffed the air and rushed through the forest towards the beach. Jim had been swept up as a second barrage of fire tore across the sky. And another.

Three in total. The freighter and two smaller ships. When he'd looked up to the turret he saw silhouetted against the twilight sky his brother Bexley. The sea air whipping his dreadlocks back from his face as he stood triumphant, the leg with the metal brace bent and his foot resting on the seat of his terrible weapon. He was leaning forward some, one arm pointed straight out to sea. Straight out to the smoking wreckages in the distance. "GET ME THOSE SMEGGIN FUEL TANKS!" he had cried in his madness against the sky. _"I'M GETTIN OFF THIS SMEGGIN WATERBALL!"_

A chill went down Jim's spine as his brother's voice echoed through his head. The haunting, raw energy of it, like a wild animal possessed after a tough kill.

"AND I'M. GETTIN. ME. A. SMEGGIN. CURRY!"

No one gave protest. No one made themselves look big, nor cried out against him.

For the small monkey man had built a weapon powerful enough to bring down the heavens. And no amount of cool could combat the fury of a mad engineer and his insatiable quest for curry and an old, creaky ship in deep space.

o0o

Ace had been careful to get in, and try to get back out again. But the Ark ship Noah was a wily beast of a ship. Part derelict, part spaceport, part last hope for mankind and all that.

Debbie had had so much trouble trying to score a single clean ident because the Ark had been split across pockets of time. All existing within the same dimension, but one deck would be frozen in place, while another deck bustling with life and still more having lost any semblance of living civilization long ago.

His ship had kept track of the time zones he passed through. Notifying him when he would return to the present, or jump into the future. Warning him of pockets into the past until finally... she had been gone. His bee resorted to internal backup power.

He tested the pockets again, and found her again, only to lose her again.

The back and forth had been absolutely aggravating, causing him to turn back. If he could find just the right time pocket... but how? And could he find one before his light bee finally powered down for good?

To keep himself charged, he found terminals to plug himself into he reached a point of no return. He needed a portable power pack. It would make it so much easier. Make him last longer. At a terminal he called up what he could of a ship’s map and manifest, but it made little sense. And without Debbie to assist in translation, it was a painstaking process. It took seventeen different terminals across twelve time zones before he found one he could understand. Well... partly.

It had been in Esperanto.

o0o

“Bex be reasonable!” Jim had pleaded with him as his brother had returned from the offshore excursion. “You’re abusing your authority! They’ve put their trust in you and now you’ve gone and smegged it all up! We’re supposed to-”

“To what?!” Bexley exclaimed, his lame leg with the brace leaving deeper indentations in the sand. “Wait around here for some... some sign? Some miracle?! You wanted me to accept it, to admit he abandoned us! You win!”

Jim followed him, but kept a small distance back, genuinely fearing his younger twin’s explosive temper. “Bex-”

“I make my own damned miracles. You can either come with me, or stay out of my way. But I’m getting off this fucking planet, and I’m getting my curry, and I’m-”

“This isn’t about the curry!”

Bexley whirled on his brother, using the heavy metal brace of his leg to knock Jim off balance onto his back, a strange homebrew device pulled from his hip was now pointed directly into Jim’s face. “It is always about the curry,” he growled.

“Curry won’t fill the hole, Bex. They’re gone. And we’re stuck here, alive. But we’re never going to get them back.”

“You just watch me,” he snarled down at him, turning to the nearest felis sapien. “Mittens, have them drag the tanks up to my ship and then see me in the workshop. I need to have a chat with the foremen.” Bexley put his device back on his belt. As he limped his way across the beach, stopping long enough to pat his turret when he passed by, he made his way into the forest.

Mittens helped Jim to his feet, hissing at Bexley’s retreating back before spitting in his direction. “If he didn’t have that laser-”

“He’s never pulled it on me before... He’s gone mad with grief,” Jim said, patting Mittens on the arm. “Look, you’ve got a crease in your sleeve. Where’s your portable iron?”

The tanned felis sapien smiled as he took out the portable device and turned it on, then touched it to his sleeve to steam out the crease. It at least had relaxed him, helped to stop the cat’s rattled nerves. Jim joined in the labor of bringing the large fuel tanks, thankful that he’d had the foresight to affix wheels to some of the boats which would make it easier for the fishermen to bring them into safety during storms.

Mittens had long since left them after passing along Bexley’s demand. Jim, though still rather small for his age (he did, after all, still look like an eleven year old child despite his 20 years of life), had helped as best as he could manage. Putting his all behind every shove and pull and shift of the massive tanks. Calling out instructions of how careful they needed to be - the fuel inside was still a danger if bumped just a little too harshly.

Hours had passed as night once more began to fall. He had gone to the patchwork Starbug that barely resembled the old ship’s design anymore after spending the dying of the light at a fire pit on the beach. Sitting with the rougher feline folk as they passed about bits of fish and traded stories.

These were the moggies he, his brother, and Ace had enlisted to help rebuild their ship. Ones that weren’t too bright, but plenty strong. Ones that had so little fashion sense that the old Earth books he’d read would call them mangy strays. Alley cats - but not quite as feral. They had good wine and good bits of fish. Bexley had made sure they were well fed as compensation for their work.

But as the daylight died and the night came in, he took his share of wine and retreated to the ship.

Exploring the refurbished inside. Trailing his hands along the interior hull walls as he pictured what it used to look like before the crash. Much of it was still the same, but some sections were gutted and replaced. The lower midsection now housed a small galley kitchen with enough room for a small table and two chairs. He didn’t want to look at the crew cabin, instead passing through onward to the front end. To the cockpit - the scene of his great cock up.

He was the smart one. He should have been able to think of a better plan to get them out of it. He should have recognized the strange blips sooner, maybe sent out some sort of modified scan frequency - but who would really think to look for clusters of light bees in space? Jim stood in the center of the cockpit, staring out at the night through the single view window out the front end. Once in awhile he would come, flip some switches in the passing hope that they would activate and he would be able to send out a distress signal.

He leaned toward the communication console and started the boot-up sequence. He did not believe their knight in golden baking foil would return for them, nor did he trust that Bexley would wait for him if given the opportunity to bail out on Fushall and the villagers who now depended upon them to fix their hair dryers and their sewing machines. His brother was intelligent, though he did not have much in the way of examples with which to compare him, but he was rash and reckless. More than he himself had ever been. Jim had learned to channel most of his recklessness early on in their lives. He had to - he was the elder. If Rimmer’s glitches ever became severe enough that they lost him as well... Someone had to provide structure and discipline for the younger. To keep him balanced and, in this case, quite literally grounded.

He watched as the computers came to life around him. Waking up from their nearly three year slumber. The one component Bexley could never get write - the computer programming. Jim smiled as the final checks went through, then... didn’t. His fail safes were still in place, overriding the main drive system. Not that the ship could start the engines without fuel anyway - but the commands required to start the process were still safely locked away from his brother’s increasing madness.

Jim, satisfied that all was well, began to shut down the computers once again... until he heard it. A frantic voice in the static. He threw himself into the communication’s chair and tried to boost the signal. “Hello?” he spoke into the receiver. “Hello is anyone out there?”

He could hardly make out a voice. He boosted the signal again, knowing that his brother, if he were listening in his workshop, would pick up on him. Would know the computers of their ship were operational after all. But it didn’t matter - it might have been Ace trying to contact them! He had to work fast, prevent his insane brother from intercepting the signal and potentially shooting whomever it was out of the sky as well. He couldn’t use a jammer or scrambler - it would put his own communications out as well. He just had to hope for the best.

He touched his hand to the transmit button, opening a channel. “This is Fushall Ground Control,” he said, stopping briefly to try and come up with something else to follow it with. “We’re receiving you, but the signal is weak. Cannot make out message, over.”

Jim sat back and waited, listening as hard as he could through the static. Trying to isolate the signal from it. He hit the transmit button again, and repeated his message. Hoping that whomever was on the other end received him clear enough.

The static died out, and he sat back in the chair with a groan.

Nothing.

Silence.

He tried once more, hitting the button. Licking his lips he took a deep breath. “This is Fushall Ground Control. If you are receiving this message, we cannot make out yours. Static. Unable to decipher. Over.” He released the button and waited. He counted. After a few minutes... nothing.

He had not realized he held his breath until he heard the crackle of a voice through static.

“Fushall Ground Control. Ship spinning out of control. Request emergency assistance!”

He routed the signal through to the Navicomp and brought up the radar.

Nothing.

Nothing.

There! There it was! A fast blip.

“Pilot, you need to slow your descent. If you have emergency thrusters, now is the time. Fire in the opposite direction of your spin. You have to stabilize.” Jim walked the panicked pilot through Space Corps emergency procedures - as much as he could remember them. He watched the radar. The blip had started to slow. But he was still too far out.

Surely Bexley would be aware of the situation by now. “Gadgets,” he said over the comm, using his brother’s chosen handle. The one they’d used in their games as children as they hid from Cat and Rimmer around the ship. He had hoped some of the sentiment might get through the aggression the other had allowed to consume him. “This is Sparks. Get a rescue crew ready. There’s a ship coming in hot. I’m monitoring the situation. Trajectory shows a hard water landing. Over.”

Static. He waited. Then, a drunken slur. “Message received. Projected coordinates? Over.”

Relief flooded through him as he read out the coordinates from his maps. Bexley replied in the affirmative. Jim wasted no time returning his attention to the flight path and the pilot.

“Rescue crew is en-route to your projected crash site. How’s that drag coming along, pilot?”

o0o

Feet pounded the metal grates hard as they ran. “This way!”

He turned, moving backwards and cocked the blaster rifle to eject the spent battery pack and line up the next one. The last one. He fired, providing cover for the men and women at his back.

“Go go go!” Ace shouted. Once the last of them had gone into the hidden tunnel, he fired off a final shot, then threw down the blaster. It was useless now without more battery packs. He reached into his coat and pulled out a grenade. Pulling the pin, he threw it back down the corridor before diving into the hidden tunnel.

Scrambling to his feet he ran through the dark, just barely keeping pace ahead of the bulkheads sealing the explosion behind him. He could see the exit ahead.

A furry face peered back at him. “It’s Ace!” the woman exclaimed, pointing into the tunnel. “It’s Ace! He made it!” She waved her arms, encouraging him on. The last bulkhead started to close. He was losing pace.

He jumped forward, giving a mighty shout as he went. He was home free - clear of the closing bulkhead.

The furry faced woman screamed. He felt pain in his leg. He checked the location of his light bee. Safely buzzing about in his abdomen. He willed his pain receptors to shut down, but he couldn’t focus. In the end, as he turned himself softlight in order to free his trapped leg of the bulkhead trying to crush it, the newly rescued mutants discovered their human savior was just as dead as the cybernetics that had held them captive.

o0o

Jim had been avoiding his brother since they had drug the pilot onto shore. He’d busied himself with overseeing the fuel transfer to Hopper’s tanks and reserves. It wasn’t that he was afraid of his younger twin brother. He was worried. Without the adventures, without the ability to stare into the star-dotted abyss and have it stare back at him he was losing his grip on reality.

He wasn’t space crazy, he was cabin crazy. Stuck. Nowhere to go. And surrounded by creatures you could watch age faster than yourself. In the three years they had been stuck, Jim mused, he and his brother had only physically aged a year and a half. Instead of nine, they looked just barely eleven. At twenty actual years, it was a difficult situation to handle when forced to live with normal people - as normal as felis sapiens could be.

He wasn’t surprised when his brother’s favorite moggy had been sent to fetch him from his work on Hopper. Mittens had thrown pebbles at the side of the ship until he poked his head out the airlock. The disheveled feline wouldn’t meet his gaze, holding a pair of manacles in one hand and pebbles in the other.

“Are you meant to be bringing me in then?”

“Yeah.”

“And if I refuse?”

Mittens held up the manacles.

Jim raised an intrigued brow. “I’ll be a moment. I’d been working on the weapons systems when you summoned me. I’ll close up the circuit and be right out.” It was a lie. One of many that rolled so easily off his tongue these days. He had merely been hiding out in the Hopper. Tinkering a bit, but mostly avoiding Bexley. It had been the safest place since he knew his brother wouldn’t turn his canon on the only way off the planet. He stopped by the crew cabin to find a few items he’d stowed in when he’d moved out of their room in the village.

Rummaging in the cardboard box, he found what he was looking for. Jim had always prided himself on never stooping to his brother’s level. Even as children back on the Dwarf, he tried to follow their uncle’s example. No, not being a coward obviously. But by trying to avoid actual conflict. By following the rules and regulations that were in place because it kept them protected and it kept them safe.

He sighed, pulling his shaggy hair back from his face and tying it back. But needs must...

When Mittens looked up at the sound of the airlock opening and closing again, Jim gave him a wary smile, a thin metal pipe slung over his shoulder. His hair kept back out of his determined face. A pair of leather gloves with fingers snipped off at the knuckles. He cracked his neck and took the steps across the sand towards the village, Mittens following behind him, fretting. “Jim! Jim don’t do this!”

“He’s spoilin’ for a twattin’ and I’m inclined to give him one.”

o0o

He held his hands out for them to see that he was unarmed. He would not harm them. “You fellas and fillies trusted me before. Just because I’m a hologram doesn’t mean I’m going to hurt you. We need to find a hangar in this local time zone and get you all out of here.”

One woman squawked at him, her long, beak-like nose turned in his direction as if she were going to attempt to peck him to pieces. “You’re one of them. Why should we trust you when you’ve been lying all this time?”

He raked a hand through his gloriously annoying floppy hair. “I get it. I really do. But right now there isn’t time to argue. They’ll be crashing through those bulkheads any minute. If we can find my ship, and get you lot loaded into one of your own, I can lead you to safety. There’s an S3 planet in the region, sparsely populated. You’ll be safe there.”

Beak-nose narrowed her eyes at him, but it was the furry cheeked gerbil girl that stole his attention. “Promise, Commander Rimmer?”

He ruffled her hair, giving off an air of certainty he did not feel. “I need to find a terminal and then we can find the best way to the docking bays.”

Ace led the way, searching for an information terminal to get a good look at a map. “We’re not too far from where I first came in,” he said once they’d been able to consult one. “If I remember correctly...”

o0o

Jim came into the village with Mittens on his heels. The pipe no longer resting on his shoulder but now clutched tightly in his dominant hand. He could feel eyes on him as he passed through the village towards where he knew his brother would be. Their old room. The room he had moved out of because he just couldn’t take it anymore.

Mittens ran ahead of him, slipping into the room quickly. Hushed voices fell silent as Jim waited, his heartbeat banging in his chest. His courage threatening to fail him. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and clutched the pipe tighter. All he needed was one good swing, knock his brother’s laser weapon out of his hand. Disarm and disable - just as he’d learned in the AR simulations Ace had run him through.

Bexley appeared in the doorway, a silhouette against the light at his back. “Jim.”

“Bex.”

“You gonna fight me?”

“You gonna see reason?”

o0o

They were running again. Ace had the gerbil girl hoisted up over one shoulder as he ran with the mutant creatures he had rescued. Gunfire resounding behind them as they ran for it. The cybernetics were right behind them.

“Deadies!” a voice screamed. Ace turned, thrusting the girl he carried at a dog-creature, taking his gun. “Go! There’s nothing you lot can do against a Deadie.”

“But Ace, what-”

He checked the rounds and hoped against hope that the subroutines of the Ace algorithm wouldn’t fail him today. It would keep his aim straight and true. “Get to the ships!” He pushed his way through the crowd, putting himself between the group and the advancing holograms.

He aimed for their midsections, his finger on the trigger and pulling back, sending short bursts of gunfire. Concentrating his aim as best as he were able.

One flickered out. A damaged light bee clattered to the floor.

Another. And another. Hologram after hologram shorting out and light bees smoking as they dropped.

But there were too many, even for the legendary Ace.

He threw down the empty gun and made a run for it. Two ships had taken off before he spotted her. Wildfire.

With gunfire at his back, he pushed himself as hard and as fast as he could. “Debbie!” he shouted. “Open up!”

The ship’s computers sprang to life for the first time in three years, since she lost his signal in a particularly long stretch of past time zone. He climbed up the ship lickity-split and dropped down into the waiting seat, yanking the cockpit closed.

“Ace? Where the smeg have you-”

“Shut up and get me the hell out of here!”

Wildfire’s engines roared to life a she started to roll forward.

“Faster! Faster!”

“I’m goin as fast as I can you clodpole!”

Soon Wildfire had shot out of the bay, narrowly missing the closing airlock doors.

“Debbie, open a communication channel. There’s two other ships out here with us. I need to make contact. Give them the coordinates for Fushall.”

“Ace?” Debbie asked once he’d finished the calls. Once things had settled and he had relaxed into his seat. He didn't respond other than to give a slight nod in the direction of her console. She took it as acknowledgement and continued. "You just stranded yourself on the ship. Sort of. I suppose this is a closed time loop now then, what with all those pockets and bubbles in that ship."

o0o

The only reason they’d stopped fighting was having to be pulled off one another. Bexley’s broken hand, his better hand, was useless and turning purple from where his brother had used the metal pipe to smack his laser out of it. The metal brace he wore on his leg had been jammed so that his leg no longer bent.

His face scratched and bleeding, much like his brother Jim’s.

But it was Jim that could still stand on his own. A twisted ankle, a dislocated arm, and he couldn’t see out of his right eye, but he’d made Bexley submit. Likely would have killed him, too, if not for the moggies. The laborers who he worked with to rebuild Hopper. To pull the fuel tanks ashore. To strip the underground caverns for supplies and resources.

The cool, fashionable, party cats might have liked Bexley best - with him running the show they didn’t have to do much thinking of their own. But it was Jim - quiet, generally good-nature Jim, that they actually sort-of respected.

As much as self-absorbed cat people can respect an evolved monkey.

Jim moved to pick up his pipe, and used it like a cane to keep him steady. He could feel Bexley’s eyes boring into him. “Put him in the cage,” Jim said. “Let him cool off for a while.”

“You can’t do this to me!” Bexley screamed as he was led away. Jim turned his back to the scene, signalling for Mittens to join him as he headed for the sick room. He needed to be tended to, but also he wished to finally meet this crashed pilot he had walked through an emergency crash.

o0o

“Ace, we have trouble.”

“I noticed,” he replied, looking at his scanners. He hailed the other two ships. “Do you have weapons on board?”

The larger of the two other ships responded. “Some. A mining laser. Some depth charges... We might have a torpedo? I don’t even know.”

“It’s alright. I’m going to patch my ship’s computer into yours. She’s going to walk you through how to use what weapons you have, alright.”

“Ace I don’t like this.”

“Neither do I. But that’s a ship of scared people we’re escorting and we have to do something. I’ll take the ship to manual. Give you more processing power to deal with the refugee ship.”

“What about the gunner ship?”

“I’m sure the old dog can handle himself.”

“I hope you’re right,” Debbie said. “There’s a freighter and two simulant fighters closing in on us.”

“A freighter?! Why?!”

Ace was answered soon enough as he put Wildfire into a dive to avoid the laser cannon fire coming off the freighter. He could feel the static in the air, even inside his ship as his projection threatened to flicker. Debbie hummed at him. “Diamond powered tachyon cannons, that’s why.”

“Smeg.”

o0o

Jim sat on an ottoman beside the silk draped cot where the pilot lay. His hair as wild and brown with streaks of grey. The young man examined the pilot from the corner of his eye while Mittens sat in front of him, stitching up the lacerations in Jim’s face.

“I don’t like the smell of him,” Mittens said, snipping a bit of string before taking Jim’s chin in his fingers and turning his head slightly to turn another laceration towards him. “He smells... wrong.” He touched a damp rag to the human’s face to clear away the blood once again. Jim winced as this, too, was sewn closed.

“That’s because he’s a alien... person... thing,” Jim replied., using the conversation to keep his mind off the pain in the absence of anything else to dull it. “Wonder where the rest of his fleet is. Or if he’s a lone ranger like Ace was.”

The body on the cot stirred. Jim waved Mittens away. “Go check on my gimboid brother, will you. I left him in a lot worse shape than he left me.”

Mittens wiped his face once more with clean, damp cloth before leaving. On his way out he wrinkled his nose at the sleeping man on the cot.

Jim sat patiently, examining the creature closely. Humanoid. Shaggy hair. Stocky build. Nothing like the lithe, light on their feet, and athletic creatures he’d come to care for on Fushall. But not entirely unpleasant to look at, either.

He reached down to brush some of the wild man’s hair away from his neck, finding there a collar with a single charm. A name tag. DOG. He frowned in concentration. This was entirely too familiar to him. But he could not recall from where or when.


	5. The Dog

Wildfire rocked back and forth as Ace attempted to draw the attention away from the refugees he had rescued. The gunner ship tried to provide cover fire for them, but it was no match for the freighter.

“Debbie, we need a solution here!”

“This area of space is temporally unstable. Without coordinates I don’t know where or when-”

“I don’t care how, just get us the smeg out of here!”

“What about your crew?”

“Just do it!” he ordered as he sent Wildfire into a spin to avoid another barrage of laser fire.

Debbie hummed back at him a moment. “I’ve got a plan, Ace. You’re approaching an ion storm. If you can lead the others into it, it should hide your energy signatures long enough for me to open a quantum portal. But I have no idea where the other end will lead, even if it’s in the same dimension.”

“If we can’t shake these smeggers, it’s the only chance we have.”

**o0o**

The man on the cot stirred once more, sniffing the air before shooting up in a panic. His eyes wide as he struggled to figure out where he was. Jim shot out an arm to steady the man, speaking as calmly as he could just like his uncle had used to do when he were a child. Well, the speaking part at least. “It’s alright. You’re safe here.”

“The others! They were right behind me!” The strange man scrambled to get to his feet, but fell back again with a loud, pained howl. “My leg!”

Jim eased the wild man back into a better sitting position on the cot. “You need to stay off your leg. I don’t think you broke it, but you’ve probably sprained it pretty badly in the crash.”

Wide, expressive eyes turned to him now. Staring at Jim in confusion. He frowned, eyes narrowing as he sniffed the air again. But the scents in the air were heavy with a musk he had not smelled in many years. What was it?... A strange dog. A very flighty, loud, yowling dog. Not a dog.

He shook his head with a whimper. Jim reached out again to touch his arm, bring him back to the present moment. Gently the young man stroked his arm in almost a petting motion. He’d done this with some of the cats over the last few years. It seemed to help settle the man, easing his mood from panic to contentment. “You’re safe here. I’ll make sure my friends keep watch for anyone else, and we’ll make them safe, too.”

The man looked at him, his brow wrinkled in thought. By the look of him, Jim assumed it took a lot of effort given the poor soul didn’t look like he had two brain cells to rub together for a bit of static discharge. “I’m the one on the radio. I told you how to bring your ship down.” He continued to stroke the man’s arm, trying his best to keep him calm. “Do you remember what happened to your ship?”

**o0o**

“Hold,” Ace ordered through the communications channel as he turned the Wildfire around. It was a difficult feat to do in the ion storm - and he hoped the old gal’s shielding would keep his bee from frying out due to the power and energy roiling about them. Once he had oriented himself and the ship to face their pursuers, he started the process of opening the wormhole - similar to the normal process of a dimension jump. But Debbie lacked coordinates.

The portal opened, and Ace kept an eye on the scanners. Waiting... waiting...

“They’ve given up the chase!” Dog barked through the comms. “I’ll lure them out.”

“Dog, no!” Ace shouted after him as he put the Wildfire into pursuit of the single man gunship. “Dog!”

Dog fired on one of the ships, zipping past to try and get them to give chase once more. Ace, lacking proper weaponry on his ship - something he should remedy - tried to intercept. Get them on his own tail.

But one of the attack ships stuck to Dog like the stench of dog’s milk and lager to the kitchen after one of Lister’s midnight meal creations. Like the mould in his socks that not even Kryten’s best and strongest detergent could loosen and remove. He pushed Wildfire to her limits, a newfound surge of hope and determination flowing through him.

He would save these pathetic excuses for hyper-evolved human animal hybrids, return home to his friends triumphant with impossible stories like this one to tell them, and he’d rub it into Lister’s gerbil-cheeked face that he, Arnold Judas Rimmer, was by far the best and the most heroic of all the Ace Rimmers to ever take the Wildfire out for a spin.

“Debbie,” he snapped in the voice of Commander Ace, with a confidence he normally did not feel. “Do we have a big blue button?”

“Ace, no.”

“Debbie old crumpet, boost the shields to maximum power and push it as far as you can to the front end.”

“You’re insane! Suicidal!” she exclaimed as he flew her straight into the heart of two attack ships and a freighter firing on a lone gunner ship.

“Probability of survival?”

“Forty-two percent.”

“Probability of Dog’s survival if I do nothing?”

She was silent.

“That’s what I thought. I want ramming speed, Debbie. Let’s shove these smeggers into the hole!”

**o0o**

He shook his head, looking down at his hands. “No. No... there was a twisty-turny thing. A little wibble.”

Jim nodded. It was still too soon to try and get any real sense out of him. He stopped petting the man’s arm and used his metal pipe to help get to his feet. “Well, you need to rest. I’ll send someone in to have a look at your ankle and with some food and water.”

The man looked up at him in wonder. Then frowned again. “What if I remember anything?”

He reached out and patted the man on the head. It seemed the natural thing to do, really. “Have them send for me. I’m sort-of the new leader here. For now. Just ask for Jim.” He turned and got a few steps away from the cot before a firm hand shot out to grab the hem of his shirt, stopping him. He half turned to look back at the pilot.

“Jim?”

The young man nodded. “Yes.”

“I knew a Jim...” he said quietly. “But they’re all gone now.”

Jim patted his hand, then pulled the hem of his shirt back from him. “Rest now, Dog,” he said, assuming the name from the tag on the collar. “I’ll send in someone to look at your leg.”

**o0o**

“I can’t take another hit, Ace!” Debbie exclaimed over the blaring klaxons.

“Just one more nudge and the-”

Together Ace and Dog had pushed and lured in one attack ship and the freighter. Wildfire barely held together. One more attempt to ram her into the attack ship and both she and he would be toast.

“One more time, Debbie you old shortcake.”

“We can’t. We’ll die.”

He knew she was right. But she was also wrong. Somehow, someway, somewhere, he would survive. He had to survive. Because he’d left a message to himself. He’d seen himself. Spoken with himself. Had seen the odd blue uniform and the stylized H emblazoned upon his aged forehead.

Aged.... Older than he was now. More simulated wrinkles with time. “Whatever happens,” he said. “Make sure you have my bee sent to Lister. My Lister. I don’t want to be part of that smegging graveyard of ghosts and copycats.”

He punched in the override codes, forcing her to change course and gripped the controls tightly. Every fibre of his being, right down to the spine he didn’t have, cried out in absolute fear and disgust that he actively fought against his true, cowardly nature.

The choice, however, had been taken out of his hands as the lone gunner ship made a bee-line for the last attack ship. Lasers firing until one of the two guns jammed. But the ship slammed it’s side into the attack ship as the pilot tried to ram it into the portal.

The attack ship had gone, sucked into the unknown as the gunner ship was out of control. There was nothing Ace could do. All of his ship’s power was consumed by the shields, holding the ship together and barely keeping the engines running. If he diverted power to the emergency tractor beam, he’d kill them both.

“Dog! Dog! Can you hear me?!” he shouted into the channel as he watched the ship helplessly begin to drift towards the portal.

“Ace, buddy. I can’t stop this thing.”

He didn’t know what else to do. “Can we get around to the other side and push him back? Push him away from the portal?”

“Not without losing full integrity of the hull. I’m struggling to keep the lights on here, Ace.”

He put his fist up and opened his mouth wide, biting down with such force that had he been living, he had been sure his teeth would break skin and he’d taste the coppery, metallic taste of blood on his tongue.

“Dog, buddy, I can’t come out to you. I’m sorry. I failed you.”

“Ace-”

“Not now, Debbie.”

“Ace, we may be able to track his progress. It’s a long shot, but I might be able to see where he’s going. If I latch onto the computers... yes. I’ll copy myself over. Try and give him some maneuverability through the wormhole. I can trace my copy until the wormhole closes. Leave myself a clue just in case we find him again.”

He didn’t even hear himself speak when he gave the order, giving Wildfire back complete control of herself before rising to go back to his lonely cot in his far too small cabin.

**o0o**

“Let me out of here!”

The cage rattled as it’s only occupant shook the bars he himself had welded together. Unlike most in his position, he hadn’t left himself a secret switch or back door or hidden lever to facilitate escape. In retrospect, he stood by his solid workmanship. But he hated his spiteful pride.

It was his pride that got him into this mess, after all.

“Oi! You!” he shouted at a passing couple of felines. “You mangy flea-riddled last season bad hair havin’ tossers!”

“It won’t work,” Mittens said from a nearby perch. “Nobody likes you anymore.”

It had been a full day since his brother had him thrown in the cage. Had him restrained long enough to deal with his injuries. Mittens, he remembered, had taken great pleasure in setting his fingers before wrapping them in sweet smelling bandages. He kicked at the sand the covered the metal floor. Couldn’t even dig his way out if he’d wanted to.

Metal hitting cobblestone alerted him to Jim’s presence.

“Come to mock me again?”

“No, I’ve come to try and get you to be reasonable.”

“You beat me to an inch of my life and you want to try and talk it out?”

“What you were doing to these people was immoral, Bexley. They are not your pets, they are not your servants or slaves. They wanted to help us fix the ship because they are kind. Selfish and self-absorbed, but kind where it counts. They saved us from the wreckage. They patched us up and welcomed us to their community. And you’ve spat in their face. Become a smeggin dictator!”

“And where were you then!” Bexley crowed from behind the bars. “Three years since he left and you’ve been running about doing hippity-dippity-doo! I needed you and you just gave up! You gave up and abandoned me!”

“I didn’t abandon you,” Jim replied in an even tone. “You pushed me away.”

“What about Hopper? You kept saying the computers wouldn’t work. That we couldn’t even send out a distress signal!”

Jim stood, leaning on his improvised cane. “I lied,” he said simply.

“I knew it!”

“I lied because you were getting out of hand. You were starting to get real peculiar. I couldn’t... wouldn’t live with myself if I let you loose on this dimension alone without someone to mind you. You’re a alcoholic wreck, and if you ever sobered up for once in your life you’d be a smeggin fine Space Corps officer like uncle always wanted. But I’ll be damned if I let the monster you’ve become go out and terrorize and enslave any other planet.”

They went back and forth like this, well into the day and evening. At last some of the nicer dressed and more stylish of the Cloister worshippers had come by to speak to Jim. Their hushed tones told Bexley little outside that he was not meant to hear a word of it. He watched his brother’s body language instead. His face and his posture and his movements as he shifted his weight from one foot to his cane and back again.

Long moments passed before Jim returned to the cage. “They’ve respectfully requested I test the ship and if it’s good to go, then I take you as far away from this place as possible.”

“What?”

“You’re staying in the cage until time to go.”

“This is ridiculous!”

“You scare them. WE scare them.”

“Yeah? Well who’s fault is that?!” Bexley rattled the cage once more in frustration and anger.

Jim’s lips pressed into a very thin line as he watched his brother inside the prison cell. Planet dwelling did not suit him. It changed him. Made him reckless and angry and frenzied. He had to get Bexley back into space, if only to get his brother back. “It’s my fault. I’m older, and you’re my responsibility. I failed Ace’s trust and I failed you.”

Bexley rattled the cage one more time before staggering back with a growl. “Go on then. Leave me to rot.”

**o0o**

The portal closed.

Dog was gone.

Ace stared at the place where the portal had been. If he had a heart, it would have sank into the stomach he also did not have. Once more... he had failed. More and more the failures were stacking up against him. He swallowed hard and hailed the refugee ship, signaling it was safe to come out of the ion storm. Debbie scanned the ship to ensure she could safely recuperate in the cargo hold, not having to fight to hold herself together in deep space.

He got what little readings Debbie had been able to gather before the portal had closed. He would find Dog again - even if only to bury the man’s corpse. Debbie, while running repairs on her systems would continuously scan space as he led the refugees to their original destination: Fushall.

In the larger, slower ship it would take a week and half if they pressed on at full speed. Two weeks if they went at safe speed.

**o0o**

It had been a few days since he’d visited his brother in the cage. A few days since Dog had come down from orbit. Jim was busy in Bexley’s workshop, attempting to make some sort of sense out of the maps the man had made. The yellow rolls of fabric with the repair schematics on them were stacked on shelves nearby. The string and twine map had been contained to a single corner of the workshop - and added to over the last three and a half years.

Some sections had been removed, others rearranged. He paid this little mind now, however, as he studied his brother’s patchwork computer terminal. Scanners, radar, sonar, and a communications system. Likely all patched through his turret to allow for clearer signal transmission. The turret would act as a satellite, or a lightning rod.

There was a knock on the door before it was opened, daylight spilling into the otherwise cramped and dingy hovel lit only by computer banks and lamps.

“Jim?”

He looked up from the charts he had been studying, having been trying to plot a course away from Fushall for himself and his brother. He blinked, staring at the wildman pilot. “You’re meant to be asleep and resting.”

“You said to come to you-”

“I said to fetch me. You needn’t come yourself.”

“Oh.”

Jim used his foot beneath the table and pushed a chair out across from him. “Might as well have a seat,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind.” Jim indicated the maps. “Only, my brother and I are being banished so I really need to sort this out.”

Dog stood shifting his weight from one foot to the other, giving the appearance of stomping in place. “I thought you said you were the leader?”

“I said I sort of was. It’s complicated. Monkey matters,’ he said. “Please, will you sit. You’re making me anxious.”

Dog sat obediently in the chair with a quickness that caught Jim by surprise. He’d never had anyone, not even his brother, respond so quickly to a request before. To cover his shock, he pressed his lips into a thin smile and kept his eyes focused on the maps and charts. “So do you remember anything from your accident?”

The man nodded vigorously, an action that seemed to go through his entire body in the chair. “Oh yes. You were on the radio. I heard you. You said Fushall.”

Jim nodded. “That’s what the locals call this place, yes. This island is Fiji. One of four.”

“He said he was taking us to Fushall. We would be safe at Fushall.”

Jim’s head snapped up, his brown eyes wide and searching the wild dog man’s face for any sign of deception or trickery. “He?”

Dog nodded vigorously again, hands gripping the seat of his chair between his thighs. Again his whole body seemed to come alive with the act, and he tried desperately not to jump from the chair and shake his entire body in excitement. He’d remembered something. He’d pleased Jim with his news. He was happy, excited by it even. “Ace! Ace said-”

“You saw Ace?!” Jim’s eyes went to their maximum wideness. “The little red single seater? Shiny gold suit?” The maps forgotten, the Dog’s excitement was infectious. The creature nodded, jumping from his seat and knocking the chair over from the table, practically hopping up and down.

“Yes! Yes! He saved us!”

“Well then where is he?!”

Dog’s excitement fell as quickly as it had come on. He frowned back at Jim and averted his eyes. “I don’t know.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. We were attacked. I fought. I came here. Everyone else, I don’t know.”

Jim watched him, then left the maps and charts and calculations for later, an idea occurring to him. “Come with me,” he said, going to Dog and patting his arm gently. Dog looked down at him briefly, but averted his eyes as Jim tugged his arm towards the door. With the Cloisters he appealed to their vanity to get their help. With the Clisters he appealed to their compassion and curiosity. It stood to reason that Dog may still have the innate personality traits of his ancestors. “Come on. Let’s go for a walk. I could use the fresh air and the exercise might do us both good.”

He picked up his pipe cane on the way out the door, pulling Dog behind him.

**o0o**

Ace sat on a barrel in the hold beside Wildfire. She had clearly seen much better days. Those dents... it’d be pretty hard to get those buffed out. He could feel her systems running. The AI Debbie whirring away in self-repairs. She had a certain... buzz to her. Annoyed. Lippy. She wasn’t a bombshell vixen, with dark hair and rich red lipstick and a tight blouse.

No, she was all rough and tumble. Zero-G football and pub crawls. Leathers and patches and heavy boots. Blackout drinking, chain smoking, and slobbing about. He’d wondered more than once which Ace had installed her. Despite the name, and the feminine voice, he knew who Debbie had been meant to be. He’d met so many different versions of Dave during his adventures that it had not been uncommon for him to meet him as Debra in universes outside that strange female dominant one. Which Ace had been masochistic enough to subject himself to Debbie’s Lister-brand of companionship.

_ “Arlene.” _

He didn’t bother looking up. If anyone were around, they wouldn’t have heard her, and would think him speaking to the air. He didn’t respond. Instead he sat in silence, now knowing he couldn’t even be alone with his thoughts. Battle calloused fingers held the old, damaged photograph, a thumb stroking the ever-present smile on the dark face.

_ “She missed her wife. A lot like you miss him.” _

That got him to break his silence. “I don’t miss him.”

_ “Yes you do.” _

“Who could possibly miss a large pile of refuse whose odour is so offensive that it could literally melt titanium beams? Who could regret leaving behind weapons-grade morning breath with the power to destroy entire ecosystems in a haze of rotten curry-lager infused fog?” he said, keeping his voice low. “Not me. That’s for certain. If I had lungs, they’d be praising every day spent outside the toxic cloud that is Lister.”

_ “You’ve regretted your decision since the day you left. The longer I’m Debbie, the worse it’s getting, too.” _

“Shut up you over sexualized calculator.”

With a buzz and a hum, she did. Popping up in his thoughts through their link one more time to inform him that her wormhole generator had burned out. She would need replacement parts.

Ace continued to sit in silence, frowning down at the smiling face that stared up at him unblinking. He knew already that somehow he made it back home. Out of everything that had happened to him since he took the flame, that was the only thing he had been certain of. He would get back home. And he would one day be back on Red Dwarf with the others. How long before his subconscious began working towards that goal?

When did he stop living the lie every waking moment of the days? When did he begin shrugging off the mask and allowing the real self to show back through?

_ “Two years.” _

“I told you to shut up.”

_ “Every two years I get a new pilot. A new Ace Rimmer. Like clockwork something happens. They make a mistake. They slip up. Or maybe they start slowing down. Their reflexes aren’t so good anymore. Or the death squads find them. Old enemies turn up again.” _

Ace sighed, and wished that she would just leave him be. Get out of his head, just for a little while. Let him have his mind to himself.

_ “You’ve been in the seat longer than most. You were gone three years on the Ark.” _

“It was a few days.”

_ “Not for me. You have been my pilot for six and a half years. Almost as long as the first Ace.” _

“How many years did he get before he took a neutron tank to the face in D-165?”

_ “Eight years. And counting.” _

He tilted his head, replaying what she had just said again. No. Certainly he didn’t hear that right. Or she was deliberately messing with him. The Debbie personality was, after all, based on a version of Lister. And Lister loved his practical jokes and japes.

“Can you run that by me again? How long?”

_ “Eight years. And counting.” _

“Again please? I don’t think I quite got that.”

_ “Eight years. And counting.” _

He stood from the barrel, putting his picture of Lister back into the inner breast pocket of his coat. Ace turned to Wildfire, needing a physical presence to glare at as his nostrils flared in a silent quake of anger. “How, Debbie, can it possibly be  **_and counting_ ** if the smegger’s deader than the entire crew of Red Dwarf?”

_ “Because he isn’t dead.” _ He felt the buzz of her personality through their shared link. The sudden, frenetic pace at which she operated had surprised him in it’s timing with the revelation.  _ “Oh dear. I... That’s not right. That was classified information.” _

“Debbie...”

_ “Ace. It seems my primary personality matrix has been a very naughty woman indeed. My self-repairs have uncovered hidden files. This may take some time to analyze and assimilate.” _

Ace’s brow creased as a thought occurred to him. “The self repairs... could they possibly restore your default personality?”

_ “Yes.” _

“You’ve done self-repairs since we crashed on Fushall, correct?”

_ “Yes.” _

“Then why are you still Debbie and not back to factory settings?”

**o0o**

He had learned much from Dog over the following days. They would meet three times a day for a walk. Once around the village. Once to Hopper down at the beach. And once to the holy site where the asteroid had crashed down.

Occasionally, when Dog would become exceptionally excitable Jim would throw a stick for him. Getting Dog into a relaxed, and safer state of mind helped him to remember his ordeals. From capture in his home dimension to his escape from a terrible place... with Ace’s help.

The more he learned from Dog, the more hopeful Jim became. The more he paid attention to the computers and the scanners and the radar. The more he monitored all the communication and transmission channels he possibly could.

It was two weeks and a few days after Dog was pulled from the sea that Mittens came running to Jim, on his walk with Dog around the village. Together the three of them made for Hopper, where the computers were more powerful.

With baited breath they waited for the systems to boot up before Jim started to boost the signal as far as he safely could. He sat, his companions holding their breath as Jim tried to establish contact.

“Contact,” Mittens said from one of the other consoles where he had been monitoring the transmissions - just as Jim had taught him to do in Bexley’s former workroom. “Sending handshake now.” A few moments passed. “Handshake received. Opening two-way channel.”

Static. Jim boosted the signal one more time, keeping an eye on the readouts. Still in the green. Barely, but still safe. “This is Fushall Ground Control,” he said into the receiver in the panel before him. “You are entering Fushall Space. Identify yourself. Over.”

A crackle of more static. Then, clear as a bell...

_“He wants to know how the kippers are doing?”_ Then, the voice on the other end was a bit softer. _“Did I say that right?”_

Dog’s face beamed, his body seeming to vibrate with joy. “Ace! It’s Ace! They made it!”

Mittens looked over his shoulder at the excitable canis sapien and wrinkled his nose. “Can we please put the mutt out? He’s stinking up the place-”

“Not just yet,” Jim replied. He motioned for Dog to come closer and spoke into the receiver again. “I’ve got a friend here who wants to say hello to the glorious golden smeghead.”

Unable to contain his excitement any longer, Dog practically jumped on top of Jim to get a chance to speak into the receiver. “Ace! Ace! It’s me, Dog! I’m here, buddy! I made it!”


End file.
